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《Fingersmith》


 PART I Chapter One

    My name, in those days, was Susan Trinder. People called me Sue. I know the year I was born in, but for many years I did not know the date, and took my birthday at Christmas. I believe I am an orphan. My mother I know is. dead. But I never saw her, she was nothing to me. I was Mrs Sucksbys child, if I was anyones; and for father I had Mr Ibbs, who kept the locksmiths shop, at Lant Street, in the Bh, o the Thames.

    This is the first time I remember thinkin<u>.99lib.</u>g about the world and my pla it.

    There was a girl named Flora, who paid Mrs Sucksby a penny to take me begging at a play. People used to like to take me begging then, for the sake of my bright hair; and Flora being also very fair, she would pass me off as her sister. The theatre she took me to, on the night I am thinking of now, was the Surrey, St Gees Circus. The play was Oliver Twist. I remember it as very terrible. I remember the tilt of the gallery, and the drop to the pit. I remember a drunken woman catg at the ribbons of my dress. I remember the flares, that made the stage very lurid; and the r of the actors, the shrieking of the crowd. They had one of the characters in a red wig and whiskers: I was certain he was a monkey in a coat, he capered so. Worse still was the snarling, pink-eyed dog; worst of all was that dogs master—Bill Sykes, the fancy-man. Wheruck the pirl Nancy with his club, the people all down ot up. There was a boot thrown at the stage. A woman beside me cried out,

    Oh, you beast! You villain! And her worth forty of a bully like you!

    I dont know if it was the people getting up—which made the gallery seem to heave about; or the shrieking woman; or the sight of Nancy, lying perfectly pale and still at Bill Sykess feet; but I became gripped by an awful terror. I thought we should all be killed. I began to scream, and Flora could not quiet me. And when the woman who had called out put her arms to me and smiled, I screamed out louder. Then Flora began to weep—she was only twelve or thirteen, I suppose. She took me home, and Mrs Sucksby slapped her.

    What was you thinking of, takio such a thing? she said. You was to sit with her upoeps. I dont hire my infants out to have them brought back like this, turned blue with screaming. What was you playing at?

    She took me upon her lap, and I wept again. There now, my lamb, she said. Flora stood before her, saying nothing, pulling a strand of hair across her scarlet cheek. Mrs Sucksby was a devil with her dander up. She looked at Flora and tapped her slippered foot upon the rug, all the time rog in her chair—that was a great creaking wooden chair, that no-o in save her—aihick, hard hand upon my shaking back. Then,

    I know your little rig, she said quietly. She knew everybodys rig. What you get? A couple of wipers, was it? A couple of wipers, and a ladys purse?

    Flora pulled the strand of hair to her mouth, and bit it. A purse, she said, after a sed. And a bottle of st.

    Show, said Mrs Sucksby, holding out her hand. Floras face grew darker. But she put her fio a tear at the waist of her skirt, and reached i; and you might imagine my surprise wheear turned out to be not a tear at all, but the neck of a little silk pocket that was sewn inside her gown. She brought out a black cloth bag, and a bottle with a stopper on a silver . The bag had threepen it, and half a nutmeg. Perhaps she got it from the drunken woman who plucked at my dress. The bottle, with its stopper off, smelt of roses. Mrs Sucksby sniffed.

    Pretty poor poke, she said, aint it?

    Flora tossed her head. I should have had more, she said, with a look at me, if she hadnt started up with the sterics.

    Mrs Sucksby leaned and hit her again.

    If I had known what you was about, she said, you shouldnt have had none of it at all. Let me tell you this now: you want an infant fing with, you take one of my other babies. You dont take Sue. Do you hear me?

    Flora sulked, but said she did. Mrs Sucksby said, Good. Now hook it. And leave that poke behind you, else I shall tell your mother youve b<tt></tt>een going with gentlemen.

    Theook me to her bed—first, rubbing at the sheets with her hands, to warm them; then stooping to breathe upon my fingers, to warm me. I was the only one, of all her infants, she would do that for. She said, You aint afraid now, Sue?

    But I was, and said so. I said I was afraid the fancy-man would fi and hit me with his stick. She said she had heard of that particular fancy-man: he was all bounce. She said,

    It was Bill Sykes, wasnt it? Why, hes a Clerkenwell man. He dont trouble with the Bh. The Bh boys are too hard for him.

    I said, But, oh, Mrs Sucksby! You never saw the pirl Nancy, and how he knocked her down and murdered her!

    Murdered her? she said then. Nancy? Why, I had her here an ho. She was only beat a bit about the face. She has her hair curled different now, you wouldnt know he ever laid his hand upon her.

    I said, Wont he beat her again, though?

    She told me then that Nancy had e to her se last, a Bill Sykes entirely; that she had met a nice chap from ing, who had set her up in a little shop selling sugar mid tobacco.

    She lifted my hair from about my ned smoothed it across the pillow. My hair, as I have said, was very fair then—though it grew plain brown, as I got older—and Mrs Sucksby used to wash it with vinegar and b it till it sparked. Now she smoothed it flat, then lifted a tress of it and touched it to her lips. She said, That Flora tries to take you on the prig again, you tell me—will you?

    I said I would. Good girl, she said. Then she went. She took her dle with her, but the door she left half-open, and the cloth at the window was of lad let the street-lamps show. It was never quite dark there, and never quite still. On the floor above were a couple of rooms where girls and boys would now and then e to stay: they laughed and thumped about, dropped s, and sometimes danced. Beyond the wall lay Mr Ibbss sister, who was kept to her bed: she often woke with the horrors on her, shrieking. And all about the house—laid top-to-toe in cradles, like sprats in boxes of salt—were Mrs Sucksbys infants. They might start up whimpering or weeping any hour of the night, any little thing might set them off. Then Mrs Sucksby would go among them, dosing them from a bottle of gin, with a little silver spoon you could hear k against the glass.

    On this night, though, I think the rooms upstairs must have beey, and Mr Ibbss sister stayed quiet; and perhaps because of the quiet, the babies kept asleep. Being used to the noise, I lay awake. I lay and thought again of cruel Bill Sykes; and of Nancy, dead at his feet. From some house nearby there sounded a mans voice, cursing. Then a church bell struck the hour—the chimes came queerly across the windy streets. I wondered if Floras slapped cheek still hurt her. I wondered how o the Bh was Clerkenwell; and how quick the way would seem, to a man with a stick.

    I had a warm imagination, even then. When there came footsteps in Lant Street, that stopped outside the window; and when the foot-

    steps were followed by the whining of a dog, the scratg of the dogs claws, the careful turning of the handle of our shop door, I started up off my pillow and might have screamed—except that before I could the dog gave a bark, and the bark had a catch to it, that I thought I knew: it was not the pink-eyed monster from the theatre, but our own dog, Jack. He could fight like a brick. Then there came a whistle. Bill Sykes never whistled so sweet. The lips were Mr Ibbss. He had been out for a hot meat pudding for his and Mrs Sucksbys supper.

    All right? I heard him say. Smell the gravy on this ...&quot;

    Then his voice became a murmur, and I fell back. I should say I was five or six years old. I remember it clear as anything, though. I remember lying, and hearing the sound of knives and forks and a, Mrs Sucksbys sighs, the creaking of her chair, the beat of her slipper on the floor. And I remember seeing—what I had never seen before—how the world was made up: that it had bad Bill Sykeses in it, and good Mr Ibbses; and Nancys, that might go either way. I thought how glad I was that I was already on the side that Nancy got to at last.—I mean, the good side, with sugar mi.

    It was only many years later, when I saw Oliver Twist a sed time, that I uood that Nancy of cot murdered after all. By then, Flora was quite the fingersmith: the Surrey was nothing to her, she was w the West End theatres and halls—she could gh the crowds like salts. She ook me with her again, though. She was like everyooo scared of Mrs Sucksby.

    She was caught at last, poor thing, with her hands on a ladys bracelet; and was sent for transportation as a thief.

    We were all more or less thieves, at Lant Street. But we were that kind of thief that rather eased the dodgy deed along, than did it. If I had stared to see Flora put her hand to a tear in her skirt and bring out a purse and perfume, I was never so surprised again: for it was a very dull day with us, when no-one came to Mr Ibbss shop with a bag or a packet in the lining of his coat, in his hat, in his sleeve or stog.

    All right, Mr Ibbs?hed say.

    All right, my son, Mr Ibbs would answer. He talked rather through his nose, like that. What you know?

    Not much.

    Got something for me?

    The man would wink. Got something, Mr Ibbs, very hot and unon ...&quot;

    They always said that, or something like it. Mr Ibbs would nod, then pull the blind upon the shop-door and turn the key—for he was a cautious man, and never saw poke near a window. At the back of his ter was a green baize curtain, and behind that assage, leading straight to our kit. If the thief was one he knew he would bring him to the table. e on, my son, he would say. I dont do this for everyone. But you are su old hand that—well, you might be family And he would have the man lay out his stuff between the cups and crusts and tea-spoons.

    Mrs Sucksby might be there, feeding pap to a baby. The thief would see her and take off his hat.

    All right, Mrs Sucksby?

    All right, my dear.

    All right, Sue? Aint you growed!

    I thought them better than magis. For out from their coats and sleeves would e pocket-books, silk handkerchiefs and watches; or else jewellery, silver plate, brass dlesticks, petticoats—whole suits of clothes, sometimes. This is quality stuff, this is, they would say, as they set it all out; and Mr Ibbs would rub his hands and look expet. But then he would study their poke, and his face would fall. He was a very mild-looking man, very ho-seeming—very pale in the cheek, with  lips and whiskers. His face would fall, it would just about break your heart.

    Rag, he might say, shaking his head, fingering a piece of paper money. Very hard to push along. Or, dlesticks. I had a dozen top-quality dlesticks e just last week, from a crib at Whitehall. Couldnt do nothing with them. Couldnt give them away

    He wo-uld stand, making a show of reing up a price, but looking like he hardly dare  to the man for fear of insulting him. Then hed make his offer, and the thief would look disgusted.

    Mr Ibbs, he would say, that wont pay me for the trouble of walking from Londe. Be fair, now.

    But by then Mr Ibbs would have goo his box and be ting out shillings oable: owo, three— He might pause, with the fourth in his hand. The thief would see the shine of the silver—Mr Ibbs always kept his s rubbed very bright, for just that reason—and it was like hares to a greyhound.

    Couldnt you make it five, Mr Ibbs?

    Mr Ibbs would lift his ho face, and shrug.

    I should like to, my son. I should like nothier. And if you was t me something out of the way, I would make my money ahis, however—with a wave of his hand above the pile of silks or notes leaming brass—this is so much gingerbread. I should be robbing myself. I should be stealing the food from the mouths of Mrs Sucksbys babies.

    And he would hand the thief his shillings, and the thief would pocket them and button his jacket, and cough or wipe his nose.

    And then Mr Ibbs would seem to have a ge of heart. He would step to his box again and, You eaten anything this m, my son? he would say. The thief would always answer, Not a crust. Then Mr Ibbs would give him sixpence, and tell him to be sure and spend it on a breakfast and not on a horse; and the thief would say something like,

    Youre a jewel, Mr Ibbs, a regular jewel.

    Mr Ibbs might make ten or twelve shillings profit with a man like that: all through seeming to be ho, and fair. For, of course, what he had said about the rag or the dlesticks would be so much puff: he knew brass from onions, all right. Whehief had gone, hed catch my eye and wink. Hed rub his hands again and grow quite lively.

    Now, Sue, hed say, what would you say to taking a cloth to these, and bringing up the shine? And then you might—if youve a moment, dear, if Mrs Sucksby dont need you—you might have a little go at the fancy work upon these wipers. Only a very little, gentle sort of go, with your little scissors and perhaps a pin: for this is lawn—do you see, my dear?—and will tear, if you tug too hard ...&quot;

    I believe I learned my alphabet, like that: not by puttiers down, but by taking them out. I know I learhe look of my own name, from handkerchiefs that came, marked Susan. As fular reading, we roubled with it. Mrs Sucksby could do it, if she had to; Mr Ibbs could read, and even write; but, for the rest of us, it was an idea—well, I should say, like speaking Hebrew or throwing somersaults: you could see the use of it, for Jews and tumblers; but while it was their lay, why make it yours?

    So I thought then, anyway. I learo cipher, though. I lear, from handling s. Good s we kept, of course. Bad ones e up tht, and must be slummed, with blag and grease, before you pass them on. I learhat, too. Silks and lihere are ways of washing and pressing, to make them seem new. Gems I would shine, with ordinary vinegar. Silver plate we ate our suppers off—but only the once, because of the crests and stampings; and when we had finished, Mr Ibbs would take the cups and bowls ahem into bars. He did the same with gold aer. He ook ces: thats what made him so good. Everything that came into our kit looking like one sort of thing, was made to leave it again looking quite another. And though it had e in the front way—the shop way, the Lant Street way—it left by another way, too. It left by the back. There was no street there. What there was, was a little covered passage and a small dark court. You might stand in that and think yourself baffled; there ath, however, if you knew how to look. It took you to an alley, and that met a winding black lane, which ran to the arches of the railway line; and from one of those arches—I wont say quite which, though I could—led another, darker, lahat would take you, very quid inspicuous, to the river. We kwo or three men who kept boats there. All along that crooked way, indeed, lived pals of ours—Mr Ibbss nephews, say, that I called cousins. We could send poke from our kit, through any of them, to all the parts of London. We could pass anything, anything at all, at speeds which would astonish you. We could pass ice, in August, before a quarter of the block should have had a ce to turn to water. We could pass sunshine in summer—Mr Ibbs would find a buyer for it.

    In short, there was not much that was brought to our house that was not moved out of it again, rather sharpish. There was only ohing, in fact, that had e and got stue thing that had somehow withstood the tremendous pull of that passage of poke— ohing that Mr Ibbs and Mrs Sucksby seemed o think to put a price to.

    I mean of course, Me.

    I had my mother to thank for that. Her story was a tragie. She had e to Lant Street on a certain night in 1844. She had e, very large, dear girl, with you, Mrs Sucksby said—by which, until I learned better, I took her to mean that my mother had brought me, perhaps tucked in a pocket behind her skirt, or sewn into the lining of her coat. For I knew she was a thief.—What a thief! Mrs Sucksby would say. So bold! And handsome?

    Was she, Mrs Sucksby? Was she fair?

    Fairer than you; but sharp, like you, about the face; and thin as paper. We put her upstairs. No-one knew she was here, save me and Mr Ibbs—for she was wanted, she said, by the police of four divisions, and if they had got her, shed swing. What was her lay? She said it was only prigging. I think it must have been worse. I know she was hard as a nut, for she had you and, I swear, she never murmured—never called out once. She only looked at you, and put a kiss on your little head; then she gave me six pounds for the keeping of you—all of it in sns, and all of em good. She said she had one last job to do, that would make her fortune. She meant to e back for you, when her way was clear

    So Mrs Sucksby told it; and every time, though her voice would start off steady it would end up trembling, and her eyes would fill with tears. For she had waited for my mother, and my mother had not e. What came, instead, was awful news. The job that was meant to make her fortune, had gone badly. A man had been killed trying to save his plate. It was my mothers khat killed him. Her oeached ohe police caught up with her at last. She was a month in prison. Then they hanged her.

    They hanged her, as they did murderesses then, on the roof of

    the Horsemonger Lane Gaol. Mrs Sucksby stood and watched the drop, from the window of the room that I was born in.

    You got a marvellous view of it from there—the best view in South London, everybody said. People were prepared to pa<figure></figure>y very handsomely for a spot at that window, on hanging days. And though some girls shrieked wherap went rattling down, I never did. I never once shuddered or winked.

    Thats Susan Trinder, someone might whisper then. Her mother was hanged as a murderess. Aint she brave?

    I liked to hear them say it. Who wouldnt? But the fact is—and I dont care who knows it, now—the fact is, I was not brave at all. For to be brave about a thing like that, you must first be sorry. And how could I be sorry, for someone I never knew? I supposed it ity my mother had ended up hanged; but, since she was hanged, I was glad it was for something game, like murdering a miser over his plate, and not for something very wicked, like throttling a child. I supposed it ity she had made an orphan of me—but then, some girls I knew had mothers who were drunkards, or mothers who were mad: mothers they hated and could never rub along with. I should rather a dead mother, over one like that!

    I should rather Mrs Sucksby. She was better by chalks. She had been paid to keep me a month; she kept me seventeen years. Whats love, if that aint? She might have passed me on to the poorhouse. She might have left me g in a draughty crib. Instead she prized me so, she would not let me on the prig for fear a poli should have got me. She let me sleep beside her, in her own bed. She shined my hair with vinegar. You treat jewels like that.

    And I was not a jewel; nor even a pearl. My hair, after all, turned out quite ordinary. My face was a onplace face. I could pick a plain lock, I could cut a plain key; I could bounce a  and say, from the ring, if the  were good or bad.—But anyone  do those things, who is taught them. All about me other infants came, and stayed a little, then were claimed by their mothers, or found new mothers, or perished; and of course, no-one claimed me, I did not perish, instead I grew up, until at last I was old enough to go

    among the cradles with the bottle of gin and the silver spoon myself. Mr Ibbs I would seem sometimes to catch gazing at me with a certain light in his eye—as if, I thought, he was seeing me suddenly for the piece of poke I was, and w how I had e to stay so long, and who he could pass me on to. But when people talked—as they now and then did—about blood, and its being thicker than water, Mrs Sucksby looked dark.

    e here, dear girl, shed say. Let me look at you. And shed put her hands upon my head and stroke my cheeks with her thumbs, brooding over my face. I see her in you, shed say. She is looking at me, as she looked at me that night. She is thinking that shell e bad make your fortune. How could she know? Pirl, shell never e back! Your fortuill to be made. Your fortune, Sue, and ours along with it...&quot;

    So she said, many times. Whenever she grumbled hed— whenever she rose from a cradle, rubbing her sore back—her eyes would fi, and her look would clear, shed grow tented.

    But here is Sue, she might as well have said. Things is hard for us, now. But here is Sue. Shell fix em . . .

    I let her think it; but thought I knew better. Id heard ohat shed had a child of her own, many years before, that had been born dead. I thought it was her face she supposed she saw, when she gazed so hard at mihe idea made me shiver, rather; for it was queer to think of being loved, not just for my own sake, but for someones I never kneV . . .

    I thought I knew all about love, in those days. I thought I knew all about everything. If you had asked me how I supposed I should go on, I dare say I would have said that I should like to farm infants. I might like to be married, to a thief or a feng-man. There was a boy, when I was fifteen, that stole a clasp for me, and said he should like to kiss me. There was another a little later, who used to stand at our back door and whistle The Locksmiths Daughter, expressly to see me blush. Mrs Sucksby chased them both away. She was as careful of me in that department, as in all others.

    Whos she keeping you for, then? the boys would say. Prince Eddie?

    I think the people who came to Lant Street thought me slow.— Slow I mean, as opposed to fast. Perhaps I was, by Bh standards. But it seemed to me that I was sharp enough. You could not have grown up in such a house, that had such businesses in it, without having a pretty good idea of what was what—of what could go into what; and what could e out.

    Do you follow?

    You are waiting for me to start my story. Perhaps I was waiting, then. But my story had already started—I was only like you, and didnt know it.

    This is when I thought it really began.

    A night in winter, a few weeks after the Christmas that marked my seveh birthday. A dark night—a hard night, full of a fog that was more or less a rain, and a rain that was more or less snow. Dark nights are good to thieves and feng-men; dark nights in winter are the best nights of all, for then regular people keep close to their homes, and the swells all keep to the try, and the grand houses of London are shut up ay and pleading to be cracked. We got lots of stuff on nights like those, and Mr Ibbss profits were higher thahe akes thieves e to a bargain very quick.

    We did not feel the cold too much at Lant Street, for besides our ordinary kit fire there was Mr Ibbss locksmiths brazier: he always kept a flame beh the coals of it, you could never say what might not turn up that would need making up or melting down. On this night there were three or four boys at it, sweating the gold off sns. Besides them was Mrs Sucksby in her great chair, a couple of babies in a cradle at her side; and a boy and a girl who were rooming with us then—John Vroom, and Dainty Warren.

    John was a thin, dark, knifish boy of about fourteen. He was always eating. I believe he had the worm. This night he was crag peanuts, and throwing their shells on the floor.

    Mrs Sucksby saw him do it. Will you watanners? she said. You make a mess, and Sue shall have to tidy it.

    John said, Poor Sue, aint my heart bleeding.

    He never cared for me. I think he was jealous. He had e to our house as a baby, like me; and like mine, his mother had died and made an orphan of him. But he was such a queer-looking child, no-one would take him<bdo>藏书网</bdo> off Mrs Sucksbys hands. She had kept him till he was four or five, then put him on the parish—even then, however, he was a devil to get rid of, always running back from the workhouse: we were forever opening the shop-door and finding him sleeping oep. She had got the master of a ship to take him at last, and he sailed as far as a; when he came back to the Bh after that, he did it with mo. The money had lasted a month. Now he kept handy at Lant Street by doing jobs for Mr Ibbs; and besides them, ran mean little dodges of his own, with Dainty to help him.

    She was a great red-haired girl of three-and-twenty, and more or less a simpleton. She had  white hands, though, and could sew like anything. John had her at this time stitg dog-skins onto stolen dogs, to make them seem handsomer breeds than what they really were.

    He was doing a deal with a dog-thief. This man had a couple of bitches: wheches came o he would walk the streets with them, tempting dogs away from their owners, then charging a ten pounds ransom before hed give them back. That works best with sp dogs, and dogs with seal mistresses; some owners, however, will never pay up—you could cut off their little dogs tail and post it to them and never see a bean, they are that heartless—and the dogs that Johns pal was landed with he would throttle, theo him at a knocked-down price. I t say what John did with the meat—passed it off as rabbit, perhaps, or ate it himself. But the skins, as I have said, he had Dainty stitg to plain street-dogs, which he was selling as quality breeds at the Whitechapel Market.

    The bits of fur left over she was sewing together to cover him a greatcoat. She was sewing it, this night. She had the collar done and the shoulders and half the sleeves, and there were about forty different sorts of dog in it already. The smell of it owerful, before

    a fire, and drove our own dog—which was not the old fighter, Jack, but another, brown dog we called Charley Wag, after the thief iory—into a perfect fever.

    Now and then Dainty would hold the coat up for us all to see how well it looked.

    Its a good job for Dainty that you aint a deal taller, John, I said. oime she did this.

    Its a good job for you that you aint dead, he answered. He was short, a it. Though a shame for the rest of us. I should like a bit of your skin upon the sleeves of my coat—perhaps upon the cuffs of it, where I wipes my nose. You should lht at home, beside a bulldog or a boxer.

    He took up his khat he always kept by him, aed the edge with his thumb. I aint quite decided yet, he said, but what I shant e one night, and take a bit of skin off while you are sleeping. What should you say, Dainty, if I was to make you sew up that? *

    Dainty put her hand to her mouth and screamed. She wore a ring, toe for her hand; she had wound a bit of thread about the finger beh, and the thread was quite black.

    You tickler! she said.

    John smiled, and tapped with the point of his knife against a broken tooth. Mrs Sucksby said,

    Thats enough from you, or Ill knock your bloody head off. I wont have Sue made nervous.

    I said at ohat if I thought I should be made nervous by an infant like John Vroom, I should cut my throat. John said he should like to cut it for me. Then Mrs Sucksby leaned from her chair and hit him—just as she had once leaned, on that ht, all that time before, and hit poor Flora; and as she had leaned and hit others, in the years iween—all for my sake.

    John looked for a sed as if he should like to strike her back; then he looked at me, as if he should like to strike me harder. Then Dainty shifted in her seat, aurned and struck her.

    Beats me, he said when he had do, why everyone is so down on me.

    Dainty had started to cry. She reached for his sleeve. Never mind their hard words, Johnny, she said. I sticks to you, dont I?

    You sticks, all right, he answered. Like shit to a shovel. He pushed her hand away, and she sat rog in her chair, huddled over the dog-skin coat and weeping into her stitches.

    Hush now, Dainty, said Mrs Sucksby. You are spoiling your nice work.

    She cried for a mihen one of the boys at the brazier burned his finger on a hot , and started off swearing; and she screamed with laughter. John put another peanut to his mouth and spat the shell upon the floor.

    The quiet, for perhaps a quarter of an hour. Charley Wag lay before the fire and twitched, chasing hansoms in his sleep—his tail was kinked where a cab-wheel had caught it. I got out cards, fame of Patience. Dainty sewed. Mrs Sucksby dozed. John sat perfectly idle; but would now and then look over at the cards I dealt, to tell me where to place them.

    Jack of Diggers och of Hearts, he would say. Or, Lor! Aint you slow?

    Aint you hateful? I would answer, keeping on with my own game. The pack was an old ohe cards as limp as rags. A man had been killed once, in a fight over a crooked game that layed with those cards. I set them out a final time and turned my chair a little, so that John might not see how they fell.

    And then, all at once, one of the babies started out of its slumber and began to cry, and Charley Wag woke up and gave a bark. There was a sudden gust of wind that made the fire leap high in the ey, and the rain came harder upon the coals and made them hiss. Mrs Sucksby opened her eyes. Whats that? she said.

    Whats what? said John.

    Then we heard it: a thump, in the passage that led to the back of the house. Then ahump came. Thehumps became footsteps. The footsteps stopped at the kit door—there was a sed of silend then, slow and heavy, a knock.

    Knooock. Like that. Like the knog on a door in a play, when the dead mans ghost es baot a thiefs knock,

    anyway: that is quid light. You knew what sort of business it was, when you heard that. This business, however, might be anything, anything at all. This business might be bad.

    So we all thought. We looked at one another, and Mrs Sucksby reached into the cradle to draw the baby from it and stop its cries against her bosom; and John took hold of Charley Wag and held his jaws shut. The boys at the brazier fell silent as mice. Mr Ibbs said quietly, Anyone expected? Boys, put this lot away. Never mind your burning fingers. If its the blues, were done for.

    They began pig at the sns and the gold they had sweated from them, ing them in handkerchiefs, putting the handkerchiefs beh their hats or irouser pockets. One of them—it was Mr Ibbss oldest nephew, Phil—went quickly to the door and stood beside it, his back flat to the wall, his hand in his coat. He had passed two terms in prison, and always swore he would not pass a third.

    The kails></details>ck came again. Mr Ibbs said, All tidy? Now, be steady, boys, be steady. What do you say, Sue my dear, to opening that door?

    I looked again at Mrs Sucksby, and when she nodded, went and drew back the bolt; the door was flung so quid hard against me, Phil thought it had been shouldered—I saw him brace himself against the wall, bring out his knife and lift it. But it was only the wind that made the door swing: it came in a rush into the kit, blowing half the dles out, making the brazier spark, and sending all my playing-cards flying. In the passage stood a man, dressed dark, wet through and dripping, and with a leather bag at his feet. The dim light showed his pale cheeks, his whiskers, but his eyes were quite hidden in the shadow of his hat. I should not have known him if he had not spoken. He said,

    Sue! Is it Sue? Thank God! I have e forty miles to see you. Will you keep me standing here? I am afraid the cold will kill me!

    Then I knew him, though I had not seen him for more than a year. Not one man in a hundred came to Lant Street speaking like him. His name was Richard Rivers, or Dick Rivers, or sometimes Richard Wells. We called him by another name, however; and it

    was that name I said now, when Mrs Sucksby saw me staring and called, Who is it, then?

    Its Gentleman, I said.

    That is how we said it, of course: not horent would say it, using all his teeth on it; but as if the word were a fish and we had filleted it—Gemun.

    Its Gentleman, I said; and Phil at o his knife away, and spat, a back to the brazier. Mrs Sucksby, however, turned in her chair, the baby twisting its scarlet face from her bosom and opening its mouth.

    Gentleman! she cried. The baby started shrieking, and Charley Wag, let free by John, dashed barking to Gentleman and put his paws upon his coat. What a turn you gave us! Dainty, take a taper to them dles. Put the water on the fire, for a pot.

    We thought you was the blues, I said, as Gentleman came into the kit.

    I believe I am turned blue, he answered. He set down his bag, and shivered, and took off his sodden hat and gloves and then his dripping greatcoat, which at once began to steam. He rubbed his hands together, then passed them over his head. He kept his hair and whiskers long and now, the rain having taken the kink from them, they seemed lohan ever, and dark, and sleek. There were rings at his fingers, and a watch, with a jewel on the , at his waistcoat. I knew without studying them that the rings and the watch were snide, and the jeaste one; but they were damn fine terfeits.

    The room grew brighter as Dainty saw to the lights. Gentleman looked about him, still rubbing his hands together and nodding.

    How do you do, Mr Ibbs? he called easily. How do you do, lads?

    Mr Ibbs said, Very well, my tulip. The boys did not answer. Phil said, to no-one, e in the back way, did he?1—and another boy laughed.

    Boys like that always think that men like Gentleman are nancies.

    John laughed too, but louder thahers. Gentleman looked at him. Hallo, you little tick, he said. Lost your monkey?

    Johns cheek being so sallow, everyone always took him for an Italian. Now, hearilema his fio his nose. You  kiss my arse, he said.

    I? said Gentleman, smiling. He wi Dainty, and she ducked her head. Hallo, charmer, he said. Theooped to Charley Wag, and pulled his ears. Hallo, you Wagster. Wheres police? Hey? Wheres police? See em off! Charley Wag went wild. Good boy/ said Gentleman, rising, brushing off hairs. Good boy. That will do.

    Then he went and stood at Mrs Sucksbys chair.

    Hallo, Mrs S, he said.

    The baby, now, had had a dose of gin, and had cried itself quiet. Mrs Sucksby held out her hand. Gentleman caught it up and kissed   it—first at the knuckles, and then at the tips. Mrs Sucksby said,

    Get up out of that chair, John, a Gentleman sit down.

    John looked like thunder for a mihen rose and took Daintys stool. Gentleman sat, and spread his legs towards the fire. He was tall, and his legs were long. He was seven- ht-and-twenty. Beside him, John looked about six.

    Mrs Sucksby kept her eyes upon him while he yawned and rubbed his face. The her gaze, and smiled.

    Well, well, he said. Hows business?

    Pretty sweet, she answered. The baby lay still, and she patted it as she had used to pat me. Gentleman o it.

    And this little bud, he said: is it farm, or is it family?

    Farm, of course, she said.

    A he-bud, or a she-bud?

    A he-bud, bless his gums! Another poor motherless infant what I shall be bringing up by hand.

    Gentleman leaowards her.

    Lucky boy! he said, and winked.

    Mrs Sucksby cried, Oh! and turned pink as a rose. You saucebox!

    Nancy or not, he could certainly make a lady blush. We called him Gentleman, because he really was a gent—had been,

    he said, to a real gents school, and had a father and a mother and a

    jster__all swells—whose heart he had just about broke. He had had

    money once, and lost it all gambling; his pa said he should never have another t of the family fortune; and so he was obliged to get mohe old-fashioned way, by thievery and dodging. He took to the life so well, however, we all said there must have been bad blood way ba that family, that had all e out in him.

    He could be quite the painter when ht chose, and had done a little work in the fery li Paris; when that fell through, I think he spent a year putting French books into English—lish books into Frenyutting them slightly different each time, and pinning different titles on them, and so making one old story pass as twenty brand-new ones. Mostly, however, he worked as a fidence-man, and as a sharper at the grand os—for of course, he could mix with Society, and seem ho as the rest. The ladies especially would go quite wild for him. He had three times been nearly married to some rich heiress, but every time the father in the case had grown suspicious and the deal had fallen through. He had ruined many people by selling them stock from terfeit banks. He was handsome as a plum, and Mrs Sucksby fairly doted on him. He came to Lant Street about once a year, bringing poke to Mr Ibbs, and pig up bad , cautions, and tips.

    I supposed he had e bringing poke with him, now; and so, it seemed, did Mrs Sucksby, for once he had grown warm again before the fire and Dainty had given him tea, with rum in it, she placed the sleeping baby ba its cradle and smoothed her skirt across her lap and said,

    Well now, Gentleman, this is a pleasure all right. We didnt look for you for another month or two. Have you something with you, as Mr Ibbs will like the look of?

    Gentleman shook his head. Nothing for Mr Ibbs, I am afraid.

    What, nothing? Do you hear that, Mr Ibbs?

    Very sad, said Mr Ibbs, from his place at the brazier.

    Mrs Sucksby grew fidential. Have you something, then, for me?

    But Gentleman shook his head again.

    Not for you, either, Mrs S, he said. Not for you; not faribaldi here (meaning John); not for Dainty, nor for Phil and the boys; nor even for Charley Wag.

    He said this, going all about the room with his eyes; and finally looking at me, and then saying nothing. I had taken up the scattered playing-cards, and was s them bato their suits. When I saw him gazing—and, besides him, John and Dainty, and Mrs Sucksby, still quite pink in the face, also looking my way—I put the cards dow once reached over and picked them up, and started shuffling. He was that kind of man, whose hands must always be busy.

    Well, Sue, he said, his eyes still upon me. His eyes were a very clear blue.

    Well, what? I answered.

    What do you say to this? Its you Ive e for.

    Her! said John, in disgust.

    Gentleman nodded. I have something for you. A proposal.

    A proposal! said Phil. He had overheard it. Look out, Sue, he only wants to marry you!

    Dainty screamed, and the boys all sniggered. Gentleman blihen took his eyes from me at last, and leao Mrs Sucksby to say,

    Get rid of our friends at the brazier, would you? But keep John and Dainty: I shall want their help.

    Mrs Sucksby hesitated, then gla Mr Ibbs; and Mr Ibbs said at once, Right, lads, these sovs is sweated so hard, the poor queens quite a shadder. Any more of it, we shall be done for treasoook up a pail, and began to drop the hot s into the water, one by one. Listen to them yellow boys cry hush! he said. The gold knows best. Now, what does the gold know?

    Go on, Uncle Humphry, said Phil. He drew on his coat and turned up his collar. The other boys did the same. So long, they said, with a nod to me, to John and Dainty and Mrs Sucksby. To Gentleman they said nothing. He watched them go by.

    Watch your back, lads! he called, as the door was closed behind them. We heard Phil spit again.

    Mr Ibbs turhe key in the lock. Then he came and poured himself a cup of tea—splashing rum in it, as Dainty had fentman. The st of the rum rose oeam, to mix with the smell of the fire, the sweated gold, the dog-skins, the wet and teaming greatcoat. The rain fell softer upon the grate. John chewed on a peanut, pig shell from his tongue. Mr Ibbs had moved lamps- The table, our faces and hands, showed bright; but the rest of the room was in shadow.

    For a minute, no-one spoke. Gentleman still worried the cards, a and watched him. Mr Ibbs watched him hardest of all: his eye grew narrow, ailted his head—he might have been lining him up along the barrel of a gun.

    So, my son, he said. Whats the story?

    Gentleman looked up.

    The story, he said. The story is this. He took out a card, and laid it, face-up, oable. It was the King of Diamonds. Imagine a man, he said, as he did it. An old man—a wise man, in his own way—a gentleman scholar, in fact; but with curious habits. He lives in a certain out-of-the-way sort of house, near a certain out-of-the-way kind of village, some miles from London—never mind quite where, just now. He has a great room filled with books and prints, and cares for nothing but for them and for a work he is piling— lets call it, a diary. It is a diary of all his books; but he has hopes for the pictures, too—has taken a mind to having them bound in fancy albums. The handling of that, however, is more than he  manage. He places a noti a neer: he he services of—here he put down another card, o the first: Jack of Spades—a smart young man, to help him mount the colle; and one particular smart young man—being at that time rather too well known at the London gaming-houses, and highly desirous of a little light out-of-the-way sort of employment, bed and board provided—replies to the advertisement, is examined, and found fit.

    The smart young man being yourself, said Mr Ibbs.

    The smart young man being me. How you cat!

    And the crib in the try, said John, taken up ilemans story despite his sulks, lets say its busting with treasure. And you

    mean to force the locks, on all the ets and chests. You have e to Mr Ibbs for a loan of nippers and a jilt; and you want Sue—with her i eyes, what looks like they aint seen butter—for your ary.

    Gentleman tilted his head, drew in his breath and raised a finger, in a teasing sort of way. Then:

    Cold as ice! he said. The crib in the try is a damnable place: two hundred years old, and dark, and draughty, and med to the roof—which is leaky, by the by. Not a rug or a vase or piece of plate worth f so much as a fart for, Im afraid. The ges his supper off a, just like us.

    The old hunks! said John. But, tight-wads like that, they stash their money in the bank, dont they? And you have made him write a paper leaving all of it to you; and now you are here for a bottle of poison—

    Gentleman shook his head.

    Not a ounce of poison? said John, looking hopeful.

    Not an ounot a scruple. And no money in the bank—not in the old mans  least. He lives so quietly and so queerly, he scarcely knows what moneys for. But there, do you see, he doesnt live alone. Look here, who he keeps for his panion ...&quot;

    The Queen of Hearts.

    Heh, heh, said John, growing sly. A wife, very game.

    But Gentleman shook his head again.

    A daughter, ditto? said John.

    Not a wife. Not a daughter, said Gentleman, with his eyes and his fingers on the Queens unhappy face. A niece. In years, he gla me, say Sues years. In looks, say handsome. Of sense, uanding and knowledge, he smiled, why, lets say perfectly shy.

    A flat! said John with relish. Tell me shes rich, at least. Shes rich, oh yes, said Gentleman, nodding. But only as a caterpillar is ri wings, or clover ri honey. Shes an heiress, Johnny: her fortune is certain, the uncle t touch it; but it es with a queer dition attached. She wont see a penny till the day she marries. If she dies a spihe money goes to a cousin. If she

    takes a husbaroked the card with one white finger—shes rich as a queen.

    How rich? said Mr Ibbs. He had not spoken, all this time. Gentleman heard him now, looked up, and held his gaze.

    Ten thousand in ready, he said quietly. Five thousand in the funds.

    A coal in the fire went pop. John gave a whistle through his broken tooth, and Charley Wag barked. I gla Mrs Sucksby, but her head was bent and her look was dark. Mr Ibbs took a sip from his tea, in a sidering way.

    Til bet the old man keeps her close, dont he? he said, wheea was swallowed.

    Close enough, said Gentleman, nodding, moving back. Hes made a secretary of her, all these years—has her reading to him for hours at a stretch. I think he hardly knows she has grown up and turned into a lady. He gave a secret sort of smile. I think she knows it, though. No sooner do I start work on the pictures than she discovers in herself a passion for painting. She wants lessons, with me as her master. Now, I know enough in that lio fake my way; and she, in her innoce, t tell a pastel from a pig. But she takes to her instru—oh, like anything. We have a week of lessons: I teach her lines, I teach her shadows. The sed week goes by: we move from shadows to design. Third week—blushing watercolours. , the blending of the oils. Fifth week—

    Fifth week, you jiggles her! said John.

    Gentleman closed his eyes.

    Fifth week, our lessons are celled, he said. Do you think a girl like that may sit in a room, with a gentleman tutor, alone? We have had her Irish maid sit with us, all this time—coughing and turning red in the face, every time my fingers stray too near her ladys, or my breath es too warm upon her little white cheek. I thought her a marvellous prude; it turns out she had the scarlet fever—is at this moment dying of it, poor bitow my lady has no chaperon but the housekeeper—and the housekeeper is too busy to sit at lessons. The lessons, therefore, must end, the paints are left to dry upon their palette. Now I only see Miss at supper, at her

    uncles side; and sometimes, if I pass her chamber door, I hear her sighing.

    And just, said Mr Ibbs, as you was getting on so nicely.

    Just so, said Gentleman. Just so.

    Poor lady! said Dainty. Her eyes had tears in them. She could cry at anything. And her quite a peach, you say? About the figure and the face?

    Gentleman looked careless. She  fill a mans eye, I suppose, he said, with a shrug.

    John laughed. I should like to fill her eye!

    I should like to fill yours, said Gentleman, steadily. Then he blinked. With my fist, I mean.

    Johns cheek grew dark, and he jumped to his feet. I should like to see you try it!

    Mr Ibbs lifted his hands. Boys! Boys! Thats enough! I wont have it, before ladies and kids! John, sit down and stop fug about. Gentleman, you promised us your story; what weve had so far has been so much pastry. Wheres the meat, son? Wheres the meat? And, more to our point, how is Susie to help cook it?

    John kicked the leg of his stool, then sat. Gentleman had taken out a packet of cigarettes. We waited, while he found a matd struck it. We watched the flare of the sulphur in his eyes. Then he leao the table again and touched the three cards he had laid there, putting straight their edges.

    You want the meat, he said. Very well, here it is. He tapped the Queen of Hearts. I aim to marry this girl and take her fortune. I aim to steal her—he slid the card to one side—from under her uncles nose. I am in a fair way to doing it already, as you have heard; but shes a queer sort of girl, and t be trusted to herself— and should she take some clever, hard woman for her new servant, why then Im ruined. I have e to London to collect a set of bindings for the old mans albums. I want to send Sue back before me. I want to set her up there as the ladys maid, so that she might help me woo her.

    He caught my eye. He still played idly with the card, with one pale hand. Now he lowered his voice.

    And theres something else, he said, that I shall need Sues help with. Once I have married this girl, I shant want her about me. I know a man who will take her off my hands. He has a house, where hell keep her. Its a madhouse. Hell keep her close. So close, perhaps ...&quot; He did not finish, but turhe card face down, a his fingers on its back. I must only marry her, he said, and—as Johnny would say—I must jiggle her, once, for the sake of the cash. Then Ill take her, unsuspeg, to the madhouse gates. Wheres the harm? Havent I said, shes half-simple already? But I want to be sure. I shall need Sue by her to keep her simple; and to persuade her, in her simpleness, into the plot.

    He drew again upon his cigarette and, as they had before, everyourheir eyes on me. Everyohat is, save Mrs Sucksby. She had listened, saying nothing, while Gentleman spoke. I had watched her pour a little of her tea out of her cup into her saucer, then swill it about the a and finally raise it to her mouth, while the story went on. She could never bear hot tea, she said it hardehe lips. Aainly, I dont believe I ever knew a grown-up woman with lips as soft as hers.

    Now, in the silence, she put her cup and saucer down, then drew out her handkerchief and wiped her mouth. She looked at Gentleman, and finally spoke.

    Why Sue, she said, of all the girls in England? Why my Sue?

    Because she is yours, Mrs S, he answered. Because I trust her; because shes a good girl—which is to say, a bad girl, not too nice about the fine points of the law.

    She nodded. And how do you mean, she asked , to cut the shine?

    Again he looked at me; but he still spoke to her.

    She shall have two thousand pounds, he said, smoothing his whiskers; and shall take any of the little ladys bits and frocks and jewels that she likes.

    That was the deal. We thought it over. What do you say? he said at last—to me, this time. And then,

    when I did not answer: I am sorry, he said, t this upon you; but you  see the little time I have had to a. I must get a girl soon. I should like it to be you, Sue. I should like it to be you, more than anyone. But if it is not to be, then tell me quickly, will you?—so I might find out another.

    Dainty will do it, said John, when he heard that. Dainty was a maid once—wasnt you, Daint?—for a lady in a great house at Peckham.

    As I recall, said Mr Ibbs, drinking his tea, Dainty lost that place through putting a hat-pin to the ladys arm.

    She was a bite, said Dainty, and got my dander up. This girl dont sound like a bitch. Shes a flat, you said so. I could maid for a flat.

    It was Sue that was asked, said Mrs Sucksby quietly. And she still aint said.

    Then, again they all looked at me; and their eyes made me nervous. I turned my head. I dont know, I said. It seems a rum sort of plot to me. Set me up, as maid to a lady? How shall I know what to do?

    We  teach you, said Gentleman. Dainty  teach you, since she knows the business. How hard  it be? You must only sit and simper, and hold the ladys salts.

    I said, Suppose the lady wont want me for her maid? Why should she want me?

    But he had thought of that. He had thought of everything. He said he meant to pass me off as his old nurses sisters child—a city girl e on hard times. He said he thought the lady would take me then, for his sake.

    He said, Well write you a character—sign it Lady Fanny of Bum Street, something like that—she wont know aer. She never saw Society, doesnt know London from Jerusalem. Who  she ask?

    I dont know, I said again. Suppose she dont care for you, so much as you are hoping?

    He grew modest. Well, he said, I think I might be permitted by now, to know when a green girl likes me.

    Suppose, said Mrs Sucksby then, she dont like you quite

    enough? Suppose she turns out another Miss Bamber or Miss

    Finch?

    Miss Bamber and Miss Finch were two of the other heiresses he had almost ed. But he heard their names, and snorted. She wont, he said, turn out like them, I know it. Those girls had fathers—ambitious fathers, with lawyers on every side. This girls uncle  see no further than the last page of his book. As to her not liking me enough—well, I  only say this: I think she will.

    Enough to do a flit, from her uncles house?

    Its a grim house, he answered, firl of her years.

    But its the years that will wainst you, said Mr Ibbs. You picked up bits and pieces of Law, of course, in a line like his. Till she is one-and-twenty, she shall need her uncles say. Take her as fast and as quiet as you like: he shall e and take her back again. You being her husband wont t for buttons, then.

    But her being my wife, will.—If you uand me, said Gentleman slyly.

    Dainty looked blank. John saw her face. The jiggling, he said.

    She shall be ruined, said Mrs Sucksby. No ent will wahen.

    Dainty gaped more than ever.

    Never mind it, said Mr Ibbs, lifting his hand. Then, to Gentleman: Its tricky. Unonly tricky.

    I dont say its not. But we must take our ces. What have we to lose? If nothing else, it will be a holiday for Sue.

    John laughed. A holiday, he said, it will be. A fug long one, if you get caught.

    I bit my lip. He was right. But it wasnt so much the risk that troubled me. You ot be a thief and always troubling over hazards, you should go mad. It was only that I was not sure I wanted any kind of holiday. I was not sure I cared for it away from the Bh. I had once goh Mrs Sucksby to visit her cousin in Bromley; I had e home with hives. I remembered the try as quiet and queer, and the people in it either simpletons ipsies.

    How would I like living with a simpleton girl? She would not be like Dainty, who was only slightly touched and only sometimes

    violent. She might be really mad. She might try and throttle me; and there would be no-one about, for miles and miles, to hear me calling. Gipsies would be no use, they were all for themselves. Everyone knosy would not cross the street to spit on you, if you were on fire.

    I said, This girl—whats she like. You said shes queer in her head.

    Not queer, said Gentleman. Only what I should call fey. Shes an i, a natural. She has bee from the world. Shes an orphan, like you are; but where you had Mrs Sucksby to sharpen you up, she had—no-one.

    Dainty looked at him then. Her mother had been a drunkard, and got drowned in the river. Her father had used to beat her. He beat her sister till she died. She said, in a whisper:

    Aint it terribly wicked, Gentleman, what you mean to do? I dont believe any of us had thought it, before that moment. Now Dainty said it, and I gazed about me, and nobody would catch my eye.

    Theleman laughed.

    Wicked? he said. Why, bless you, Dainty, of course its wicked! But its wicked to the tune of fifteen thousand pounds—and oh! but thats a sweet tune, hum it how you will. Then again, do you suppose that when that money was first got, it was got holy? Dont think it! Money never is. It is got, by families like hers, from the backs of the poor—twenty backs broken for every shilling made. You have heard, have you, of Robin Hood? Have I! she said.

    Well, Sue and I shall be like him: taking gold from the rid passing it back to the people it was got from.

    John curled his lip. You ponce, he said. Robin Hood was a hero, a man of ass the moo the people? eople are yours! You want to rob a lady, go and rob your own mother.

    My mother? answered Gentleman, c up. Whats my mother to do with anything? Hang my mother! Then he caught Mrs Sucksbys eye, and turo me. Oh, Sue, he said. I do beg your pardon.

    Its all right, I said quickly. And I gazed at the table, and again everyone grew quiet. Perhaps they were all thinking, as they did on hanging days, Aint she brave? I hoped they were. Then again, I hoped they werent: for, as I have said, I never was brave, but had got away with people supposing I was, for seventeen years. Now here was Gentleman, needing a bold girl and ing—forty miles, he had said, in all that cold and slippery weather—to me.

    I raised my eyes to his.

    Two thousand pounds, Sue, he said quietly.

    Thatll shine very bright, all right, said Mr Ibbs.

    And all them frocks and jewels! said Dainty. Oh, Sue! Shouldnt you look handsome, in them!

    You should look like a lady, said Mrs Sucksby; and I heard her, and caught her gaze, and knew she was looking at me—as she had, so many times before—and was seeing, behind my face, my mothers. Your fortuill to be made.—I could almost hear her saying it. Your fortuill to be made; and ours, Sue, along with it . . .

    And after all, she had been right. Here was my fortune, e from nowhere—e, at last. What could I say? I looked again at Gentleman. My heart beat hard, like hammers in my breast. I said:

    All right. Ill do it. But for three thousand pounds, not two. And if the lady dont care for me and sends me home, I shall want a hundred anyway, for the trouble .

    He hesitated, thinking it over. Of course, that was all a show. After a sed he smiled, then he held his hand to me and I gave him mine. He pressed my fingers, and laughed.

    John scowled. Ill give you ten to one she es back g in a week, he said.

    Ill e back dressed in a velvet gown, I answered. With gloves up to here, and a hat with a veil on, and a bag full of silver . And you shall have to call me miss. Wont he, Mrs Sucksby?

    He spat. Ill tear my own to, before I do that!

    Ill tear it out first! I said.

    I sound like a child. I was a child! Perhaps Mrs Sucksby was

    thinking that, too. For she said nothing, only sat, still gazing at me, with her hand at her soft lip. She smiled; but her face seemed troubled. I could almost have said, she was afraid.

    Perhaps she was.

    Or perhaps I only think that now, when I know what dark and fearful things were to follow.

 Chapter Two

    The bookish old man, it turned out, was called Christopher  Lilly. The nieame was Maud. They lived west of London, out Maidenhead-way, near a village named Marlow, and in a house they called Briar. Gentlemans plan was to sehere alone, by train, in two days time. He himself, he said, must stay in London for another week at least, to do the old mans business over the bindings of his books.

    I didnt care much for the detail of my travelling down there, and arriving at the house, all on my own. I had never been much further west before than the Cremardens, where I sometimes went with Mr Ibbss nephews, to watch the dang on a Saturday night. I saw the French girl cross the river on a wire from there, and almost drop—that was something. They say she wore stogs; her legs looked bare enough to me, though. But I recall standing on Battersea Bridge as she walked her rope, and looking out, past Hammersmith, to all the tryside beyond it, that was just trees

    and hills and not a ey or the spire of a chur sight—and oh! that was a very chilling thing to see. If you had said to me then, that I would one day leave the Bh, with all my pals in it, and Mrs Sucksby and Mr Ibbs, and go quite aloo a maids pla a house the other side of those dark hills, I should have laughed in your face.

    But Gentleman said I must go soon, in case the lady—Miss Lilly—should spoil our plot, by actally taking anirl to be her servant. The day after he came to Lant Street he sat and wrote her out a letter. He said he hoped she would pardon the liberty of his writing, but he had been on a visit to his old hat had been like a mother to him, when he was a boy—and he had found her quite demented with grief, over the fate of her dead sisters daughter. Of course, the dead sisters daughter was meant to be me: the story was, that I had been maiding for a lady who was marrying and heading off for India, and had lost my place; that I was looking out for another mistress, but was meanwhile beied on every side to go to the bad; and that if only some softhearted lady would give me the ce of a situation far away from the evils of the city—and so on.

    I said, If shell believe bouncers like those, Gentleman, she must be even sillier than you first told us.

    But he answered, that there were about a hundred girls betweerand and Piccadilly, who dined very handsomely off that story, five nights a week; and if the hard swells of London could be separated from their shillings by it, then how much kinder wasnt Miss Maud Lilly likely to be, all alone and unknowing and sad as she was, and with no-oo tell her aer?

    Youll see, he said. And he sealed the letter and wrote the dire, and had one of our neighbours boys run with it to the post.

    Then, so sure was he of the success of his plan, he said they must begin at oo teach me horoper ladys maid should be.

    First, they washed my hair. I wore my hair then, like lots of the Bh girls wore theirs, divided in three, with a b at the bad, at the sides, a few fat curls. If you turhe curls with a very hot iron, having first made the hair wet with sugar-and-water, you

    could make them hard as anything; they would last for a week like that, or lentleman, however, said he thought the style too fast for a try lady: he made me wash my hair till it erfectly smooth, then had me divide it once—just the ohen pin it in a plain knot at the bay head. He had Dainty wash her hair, too, and when I had bed and re-bed mine, and pinned and re-pi, until he was satisfied, he made me b and pin hers in a matg style, as if hers was the ladys, Miss Lillys. He fussed about us like a regular girl. When we had finished, Dainty and I looked that plain and ba-faced, we might have been trying for places in a nunnery. John said if they would only put pictures of us in the dairies, it would be a new way of curdling milk.

    When Dainty heard that she pulled the pins from her hair and threw them at the fire. Some had hair still ging to them, and the flames set it hissing.

    t you do anything to that girl of yours, said Mr Ibbs to John, but make her cry?

    John laughed. I likes to see her cry, he said. It makes her sweat the less.

    He was an evil boy, all right.

    But he was quite caught up ilemans plot, despite himself. We all were. For the first time I ever knew, Mr Ibbs kept the blind pulled down on his shop door a his brazier go cold. When people came knog with keys to be cut, he sent them away. To the two or three thieves that brought poke, he shook his head.

    t do it, my son. Not to-day. Got a little something cooking.

    He only had Phil e, early in the m. He sat him down and ran him through the points of a list that Gentleman had drawn up the night before; then Phil pulled his cap down over his eyes, a. When he came back two hours later it was with a bag and a vas-covered trunk, that he had got from a man he knew, who ran a crooked warehouse at the river.

    The trunk was for me to take to the try. In the bag was a brown stuff dress, more or less my size; and a cloak, and shoes, and black silk stogs; and on top of it all, a heap of ladys real white uhings.

    Mr Ibbs only undid the string at the neck of the bag, peeped in, and saw the lihen he went and sat at the far side of the kit, where he had a Bramah lock he liked sometimes to take apart, and powder, and put back together. He made John go with him and hold the screws. Gentleman, however, took out the ladys items one by one, and placed them flat upoable. Beside the table he set a kit chair.

    Now, Sue, he said, suppose this chairs Miss Lilly. How shall you dress her? Lets say you start with the stogs and drawers. The drawers? I said. You dont mean, shes naked?

    Dainty put her hand to her mouth and tittered. She was sitting at Mrs Sucksbys feet, having her hair re-curled.

    Naked? said Gentleman. Why, as a nail. What else? She must take off her clothes when they grow foul; she must take them off to bathe. It will be your job to receive them when she does. It will be your job to pass her her fresh ones.

    I had not thought of this. I wondered how it would be to have to stand and hand a pair of drawers to a strange bare girl. A strange bare girl had once run, shrieking, down Lant Street, with a poli and a nurse behind her. Suppose Miss Lilly toht like that, and I had to grab her? I blushed, aleman saw. e now, he said, almost smiling. Dont say youre squeamish?

    I tossed my head, to show I wasnt. He hen took up a pair of the stogs, and then a pair of drawers. He placed them, dangling, over the seat of the kit chair.

    What ? he asked me.

    I shrugged. Her shimmy, I suppose.

    Her chemise, you must call it, he said. And you must make sure to warm it, before she puts it on.

    He took the shimmy up and held it close to the kit fire. The it carefully above the drawers, over the back of the chair, as if the chair was wearing it.

    Now, her corset, he said . She will want you to tie this for her, tight as you like. e os see you do it.

    He put the corset about the shimmy, with the laces at the back; and while he leaned upon the chair to hold it fast, he made me pull

    the laces and knot them in a bow. They left lines of red and white upon my palms, as if I had been whipped.

    Why dont she wear the kind of stays that fasten at the front, like a regular girl? said Dainty, watg.

    Because then, said Gentleman, she shouldnt need a maid. And if she didnt need a maid, she shouldnt know she was a lady. Hey? He winked.

    After the corset came a camisole, and after that a dicky; then came a nine-hoop oline, and then more petticoats, this time of silk. Theleman had Dainty run upstairs for a bottle of Mrs Sucksbys st, and he had me spray it where the splintered wood of the chair-back showed between the ribbons of the shimmy, that he said would be Miss Lillys throat.

    And all the time I must say:

    Will you raise your arms, miss, for me thten this frill? and,

    Do you care for it, miss, with a ruffle or a flounce? and,

    Are you ready for it now, miss?

    Do you like it drawn tight?

    Should you like it to be tighter?-

    Oh! Five me if I pinch.

    At last, with all the bending and the fussing, I grew hot as a pig. Miss Lilly sat before us with her corset tied hard, her petticoats spread out about the floor, smelling fresh as a rose; but rather wanting, of course, about the shoulders and the neck.

    John said, Dont say much, do she? He had been sneaking gla us all this time, while Mr Ibbs put the powder to his Bramah.

    Shes a lady, said Gentleman, stroking his beard, and naturally shy. But shell pick up like anything, with Sue ao teach her. Wont you, darling?

    He squatted at the side of the chair and smoothed his fingers over the bulging skirts; then he dipped his hah them, reag high into the layers of silk. He did it so ly, it looked to me as if he knew his way, all right; and as he reached higher his cheek grew

    pink, the silk gave a rustle, the oline bucked, the chair quivered hard upo floor, the joints of its legs faintly shrieking. Then it was still.

    There, you sweet little bitch, he said softly. He drew out his hand and held up a stog. He passed it to me, and yawned. Now, lets say its bed-time.

    John still watched us, saying nothing, only blinking and jiggling his leg. Dainty rubbed her eye, her hair half curled, smelling powerfully of toffee.

    I began at the ribbons at the waist of the dickies, the loose the laces of the corset and eased it free.

    Will you just lift your foot, miss, for me to take this from you?

    Will you breathe a little softer, miss? and then it will e.

    He kept me w like that for an hour or more. Then he warmed up a flat-iron.

    Spit on this, will you, Dainty? he said, holding it to her. She did; and when the spit gave a sizzle he took out a cigarette, and lit it on the irons hot base. Then, while he stood by and smoked, Mrs Sucksby—who had once, long ago, in the days before she ever thought of farming infants, been a mangling-woman in a laundry— showed me how a ladys linen should be pressed and folded; and that, I should say, took about another hour.

    Thelema me upstairs, to put on the dress that Phil had got for me. It lain brown dress, more or less the colour of my hair; and the walls of our kit being also brown, when I came downstairs again I could hardly be seen. I should have rathered a blue gown, or a violet one; but Gentleman said it was the perfect dress for a sneak or for a servant—and so all the more perfee, who was going to Briar to be both.

    We laughed at that; and then, when I had walked about the room to grow used to the skirt (which was narrow), and to let Dainty see where the cut was toe and itg, he had me stand and try a curtsey. This was harder than it sounds. Say what you like about the kind of life I was used to, it was a life without masters: I had never curtseyed before to anyone. Now Gentleman had me

    dipping up and down until I thought I should be sick. He said curtseying came as natural to ladies maids, as passing wind. He said if I would only get the trick, I should never fet it—and he was right about that, at least, for I  still dip a proper curtsey, even now.— Or could, if I cared to.

    Well. When we had finished with the curtseys he had me learn my story. Then, to test me, he made me stand before him a my part, like a girl saying a catechism.

    Now then, he said. What is your name?

    Aint it Susan? I said.

    Aint it Susan, what?

    Aint it Susan Trinder?

    Aint it Susan, sir. You must remember, I shant be Gentleman to you at Briar. I shall be Mr Richard Rivers. You must call me sir; and you must call Mr Lilly sbbr></abbr>ir; and the lady you must call miss or Miss Lilly or Miss Maud, as she directs you. And we shall all call you Susan. He frowned. But, not Susan Trihat may lead them back to Lant Street if things g. We must find you a better sed name—

    Valentine, I said, straight off. What  I tell you? I was only seventeen. I had a weakness for hearts. Gentleman heard me, and curled his lip.

    Perfect, he said; —if we were about to put you oage.

    I know real girls named Valentine! I said.

    Thats true, said Dainty. Floy Valentine, awo sisters. Lord, I hates those girls, though. You dont want to be named for them, Sue.

    I bit my finger. Maybe not.

    Certainly not, said Gentleman. A fanciful name might ruin us. This is a life-ah business. We need a hat will hide you, n you to everyones notice. We need a name—he thought it over—an untraceable name, yet one we shall remember . . . Brown? To match your dress? Or—yes, why not? Lets make it, Smith. Susan Smith. He smiled. You are to be a sort of smith, after all. This sort, I mean.

    He let his hand drop, and tur, and crooked his middle

    finger; and the sign, and the word he meant—fingersmith—being Bh code for thief, we laughed again.

    At last he coughed, and wiped his eyes. Dear me, what fun, he said. Now, where had we got to? Ah, yes. Tell me again. What is your name?

    I said it, with the sir after.

    Very good. And what is your home?

    My home is at London, sir, I said. My mother being dead, I live with my old aunty; which is the lady what used to be your nurse when you was a boy, sir.

    He nodded. Very good as to detail. Not so good, however, as to style. e now: I know Mrs Sucksby raised you better than that. Youre not selling violets. Say it again.

    I pulled a face; but then said, more carefully,

    The lady that used to be your nurse when you were a boy, sir.

    Better, better. And what was your situation, before this?

    With a kind lady, sir, in Mayfair; who, being lately married and about to go to India, will have a native girl to dress her, and so wont need me.

    Dear me. You are to be pitied, Sue.

    I believe so, sir.

    And are you grateful to Miss Lilly, for having you at Briar?

    Oh, sir! Gratitude aint in it!

    Violets again! He waved his hand. Never mind, that will do. But dont hold my gaze so boldly, will you? Look, rather, at my shoe. Thats good. Now, tell me this. This is important. What are your duties while attending your new mistress?

    I must wake her in the ms, I said, and pour out her tea. I must wash her, and dress her, and brush her hair. I must keep her jewellery , and not steal it. I must walk with her when she has a fancy to walk, and sit when she fancies sitting. I must carry her fan for when she grows too hot, her  for when she feels nippy, her eau-de-Cologne for if she gets the head-ache, and her salts for when she es over queer. I must be her chaperon for her drawing-lessons, and not see when she blushes.

    Splendid! And what is your character?

    Ho as the day

    And what is your object, that no-o we must know?

    That she will love you, and leave her uncle for your sake. That she will make your fortune; and that you, Mr Rivers, will make mine.

    I took hold of my skirts and showed him one of those smooth curtseys, my eyes all the time ooe of his boot.

    Dainty clapped me. Mrs Sucksby rubbed her hands together and said,

    Three thousand pounds, Sue. Oh, my crikey! Dainty, pass me an infant, I want something to squeeze.

    Gentleman stepped aside and lit a cigarette. Not bad, he said. Not bad, at all. A little fining down, I think, is all thats needed now. We shall try again later.

    Later? I said. Oh, Gentleman, aint you finished with me yet? If Miss Lilly will have me as her maid for the sake of pleasing you, why should she care how fined down I am?

    She may not mind, he answered. I think we might put an apron on Charley Wag and send him, for all she will mind or wonder. But it is not only her that you will have to fool. There is the old man, her uncle; and besides him, all his staff.

    I said, His staff? I had not thought of this.

    Of course, he said. Do you think a great house runs itself? First of all theres the steward, Mr Way—

    Mr Way! said John with a snort. Do they call him Milky?

    No, said Gentlemaurned bae. Mr Way, he said again. I should say he wont trouble you much, though. But there is also Mrs Stiles, the housekeeper—she may study you a little harder, you must be careful with her. And then there is Mr Ways boy Charles, and I suppose one or two girls, for the kit work; and one or two parlourmaids; and grooms and stable-boys and gardeners—but you shant see much of them, dont think of them.

    I looked at him in horror. I said, You never said about them before. Mrs Sucksby, did he say about them? Did he say, there will be about a hundred servants, that I shall have to play the maid for?

    Mrs Sucksby had a baby and was rolling it like dough. Be fair now, Gentleman, she said, not looking over. You did keep very dark about the servants last night.

    He shrugged. A detail, he said.

    A detail? That was like him. Telling you half of a story and making out you had it all.

    But it was too late now, for a ge of heart. The  day Gentleman worked me hard again; and the day after that he got a letter, from Miss Lilly.

    He got it at the post-offi the City. Our neighbours would have wondered what , if wed had a letter e to the house. He got it, and brought it back, and ope while we looked on; the in sileo hear it—Mr Ibbs only drumming his fingers a little oable-top, by which I khat he was nervous; and so grew more nervous myself.

    The letter was a short one. Miss Lilly said, first, what a pleasure it was, to have received Mr Riverss note; and how thoughtful he was, and how kind to his old nurse. She was sure, she wished mentlemen were as kind and as thoughtful as him!

    Her u on very badly, she said, now his assistant was gohe house seemed very ged and quiet and dull; perhaps this was the weather, which seemed to have turned. As for her maid— Here Gentleman tilted the letter, the better to catch the light.—As for her maid, pnes: she leased to be able to tell him that Agnes looked set not to die after all—

    We heard that and drew in our breaths. Mrs Sucksby closed her eyes, and I saw Mr Ibbs give a gla his cold brazier and re up the business he had lost in the past two days. But theleman smiled. The maid was not about to die; but her health was so ruined and her spirits so low, they were sending her back to Cork.

    God bless the Irish! said Mr Ibbs, taking out his handkerchief and wiping his head.

    Gentleman read on.

    I shall be glad to see the girl you speak of, Miss Lilly wrote. I should be glad if you would seo me, at once. I am grateful

    to anyone for remembering me. I am not over-used to people thinking of my forts. If she be only a good and willing girl, then I am sure I shall love her. And she will be the dearer to me, Mr Rivers, because she will have e to me from London, that has you in it.

    He smiled again, raised the letter to his mouth, and passed it bad forth across his lips. His snide ring glittered in the light of the lamps.

    It had all turned out, of course, just as the clever devil had promised.

    That night—that was to be my last night at Lant Street, and the first night of all the nights that were meant to lead to Gentlemans seg of Miss Lillys fortuhat night Mr Ibbs sent out for a hot roast supper, and put irons to heat in the fire, for making flip, in celebration.

    The supper igs head, stuffed at the ears—a favourite of mine, and got in my honour. Mr Ibbs took the carving-ko the back-door step, put up his sleeves, and stooped to sharpen the blade. He leaned with his hand on the door-post, and I watched him do it with a queer sensation at the roots of my hair: for all up the post were cuts from where, each Christmas Day when I was a girl, he had laid the knife upon my head to see how high Id grown. Now he drew the blade bad forth across the stone, until it sang; then he ha to Mrs Sucksby and she dished out the meat. She always carved, in our house. An ear apiece, for Mr Ibbs aleman; the snout for John and Dainty; and the cheeks, that were the te parts, for herself and for me.

    It was all got, as Ive said, in my honour. But, I dont know—perhaps it was seeing the marks on the door-post; perhaps it was thinking of the soup that Mrs Sucksby would make, when I wouldhere to eat it, with the bones of the roast pigs head; perhaps it was the head itself—which seemed to me to be grimag, rather, the lashes of its eyes and the bristles of its snout gummed brown with treacly tears—but as we sat about the table, I grew sad. John and Dainty wolfed their dinner down, laughing and quarrelling, now and then firing up wheleman teased, and now and then sulking. Mr Ibbs wely to work on his plate, and

    Mrs Sucksby wely to work on hers; and I picked over my bit of pork and had no appetite.

    I gave half to Dainty. She gave it to John. He snapped his jaws and howled, like a dog.

    And then, when the plates were cleared away Mr Ibbs beat the eggs and the sugar and the rum, to make flip. He filled seven glasses, took the irons from the brazier, waved them for a sed to take the sting of the heat off, then pluhem iing the flip was like setting fire to the brandy on a plum pudding—everyone liked to see it done ahe drinks go hiss. John said,  I do one, Mr Ibbs?—his face red from the supper, and shiny like paint, like the face of a boy in a picture in a toy-shop window.

    We sat, and everyoalked and laughed, saying what a fihing it would be wheleman was made rich, and I came home with my cool three thousand; and still I kept rather quiet, and no-one seemed to notice. At last Mrs Sucksby patted her stomad said,

    Wont you give us a tune, Mr Ibbs, to put the baby to bed by?

    Mr Ibbs could whistle like a kettle, for an hour at a go. He put his glass aside and wiped the flip from his moustache, and started up with The Tarpaulin Jacket. Mrs Sucksby hummed along until her eyes gre, and then the hum got broken. Her husband had been a sailor, and been lost at sea.—Lost to her, I mean. He lived in the Bermudas.

    Handsome, she said, when the song was finished. But lets have a lively o, for heavens sake!—else I shall be drove quite maudlis see the youngsters have a bit of a dance.

    Mr Ibbs struck up with a quick tuhen, and Mrs Sucksby clapped, and John and Dainty got up and pushed the chairs back. Will you hold my earrings for me, Mrs Sucksby? said Dainty. They dahe polka until the a ors upon the mantelpiece jumped and the dust rose inches high about their thumpi. Gentleman stood and leaned and watched them, smoking a cigarette, calling Hup! and Go it, Johnny!, as he might call, laughing, to a terrier in a fight he had  on.

    When they asked me to join them, I said I would not. The dust

    made me sneeze and, after all, the iron that had warmed my flip had beeed too hard, and the egg had curdled. Mrs Sucksby had put by a glass and a plate of morsels of meat for Mr Ibbss sister, and I said I would carry them up.—All right, dear girl, she said, still clapping out the beat. I took the plate and the glass and a dle, and slipped upstairs.

    It was like stepping out of heaven, I always thought, to leave our kit on a winters night. Even so, when I had left the food beside Mr Ibbss sleeping sister ao one or two of the babies, that had woken with the sounds of the dang below, I did not go back to joihers. I walked the little way along the landing, to the door of the room I shared with Mrs Sucksby; and then I went up the  pair of stairs, to the little attic I had been born in.

    This room was always cold. Tonight there was a breeze up, the window was loose, and it was colder thahe floor lain boards, with strips et on it. The walls were bare, but for a bit of blue oil-cloth that had been tacked to catch the splashes from a wash-stand. The stand, at the moment, was draped with a waistcoat and a shirt, of Gentlemans, and one or two collars. H<s>.</s>e always slept here, when he came to visit; though he might have made a bed with Mr Ibbs, down i. I know which place I would have chosen. On the flged his high leather boots, that he had scraped the mud from and shined. Beside them was his bag, with more white linen spilling from it. On the seat of a chair were some s from his pocket, a packet of cigarettes, and sealing-wax. The s were light. The wax was brittle, like toffee.

    The bed was roughly made. There was a red velvet curtain upon it, with the rings taken off, for a terpa had been got from a burning house, and still smelt of ders. I took it up and put it about my shoulders, like a cloak. Then I pinched out the flame of my dle and stood at the window, shivering, looking out at the roofs and eys, and at the Horsemonger Lane Gaol where my mother was hanged.

    The glass of the window had the first few blooms of a new frost upon it, and I held my fio it, to make the ice turn to dirty water. I could still catch Mr Ibbss whistle and the bounce of

    Daintys feet, but before me the streets of the Bh were dark. There was only here and there a feeble light at a window like mine, and then the lantern of a coach, throwing shadows; and then a person, running hard against the cold, quid dark as the shadows, and as quickly e and gone. I thought of all the thieves that must be there, and all the thieves children; and then of all the regular men and women who lived their lives—their strange and ordinary lives—in other houses, other streets, in the brighter parts of London. I thought of Maud Lilly, in her great house. She did not know my name—I had not known hers, three days before. She did not know that I was standing, plotting her ruin, while Dainty Warren and John Vroom danced a polka in my kit.

    What was she like? I knew a girl named Maud once, she had half a lip. She used to like to make out that the other half had been lost in a fight; I knew for a fact, however, she had been born like that, she couldnt fight putty. She died in the end—not from fighting, but through eating bad meat. Just o of bad meat killed her, just like that.

    But, she was very dark. Gentleman had said that the other Maud, his Maud, was fair and rather handsome. But when I thought of her, I could picture her only as thin and brown and straight, like the kit chair that I had tied the corset to.

    I tried another curtsey. The velvet curtain made me clumsy. I tried again. I began to sweat, in sudden fear.

    Then there came the opening of the kit door and the sound of footsteps oair, and then Mrs Sucksbys voice, calling for me. I didnt answer. I heard her walk to the bedrooms below, and look for me there; then there was a silehen her feet again, upoic stairs, and then came the light of her dle. The climb made her sigh a little—only a little, for she was very nimble, for all that she was rather stout.

    Are you here then, Sue? she said quietly. And all on your own, in the dark?

    She looked about her, at all that I had looked at—at the s and the sealing-wax, alemans boots aher bag. Then she

    came to me, and put her warm, dry hand to my cheek, and I said— just as if she had tickled or pinched me, and the words were a chuckle or a cry I could not stop—I said:

    What if I aint up to it, Mrs Sucksby? What if I t do it? Suppose I lose my nerve a you down? Hadnt we ought to send Dainty, after all?

    She shook her head and smiled. Now, then, she said. She led me to the bed, a and she drew down my head until it rested in her lap, and she put back the curtain from my cheek and stroked my hair. Now, then.

    Aint it a long way to go? I said, looking up at her face.

    Not so far, she answered.

    Shall you think of me, while I am there?

    She drew free a strand of hair that was caught about my ear.

    Every minute, she said, quietly. Aint you my own girl? And wont I worry? But you shall have Gentleman by you. I should never have let you go, for any ordinary villain.

    That was true, at least. But still my heart beat fast. I thought again of Maud Lilly, sitting sighing in her room, waiting for me to e and unlace her stays and hold her nightgown before the fire. Poor lady, Dainty had said.

    I chewed at the inside of my lip. Then: Ought I to do it, though, Mrs Sucksby? I said. Aint it a very mean trick, and shabby?

    She held my gaze, then raised her eyes and o the view beyond the window. She said, I know she would have do, and not given it a thought. And I know what she would feel in her heart—what dread, but also ride, and the pride part winning—to see you doing it now.

    That made me thoughtful. For a minute, we sat and said nothing. And what I asked her  was something I had never asked before—something which, in all my years at Lant Street, amongst all those dodgers and thieves, I had never heard anyone ask, not ever. I said, in a whisper,

    Do you think it hurts, Mrs Sucksby, when they drop you?

    Her hand, that was smoothing my hair, grew still. Then it started up stroking, sure as before. She said,

    I should say you dont feel nothing but the rope about your neck. Rather ticklish, I should think it.

    Ticklish?

    Say then, pricklish.

    Still her ha smoothing.

    But when the drop is opened? I said. Wouldnt you say you felt it then?

    She shifted her leg. Perhaps a twitch, she admitted, when the drop is opened.

    I thought of the men I had seen fall at Horsemonger Lahey twitched, all right. They twitched and kicked about, like monkeys on sticks.

    But it es that quick at the last, she went ohat I rather think the quiess must take the pain  out of it. And when it es to dropping a lady—well, you know they place the knot in such a way, Sue, that the end es all the quicker?

    I looked up at her again. She had set her dle on the floor, and the light striking her face all from beh, it made her cheeks seem swollen and her eyes seem old. I shivered, and she moved her hand to my shoulder and rubbed me, hard, through the velvet.

    Theilted her head. Theres Mr Ibbss sister, quite bewildered again, she said, and calling on her mother. She has been calling on her, poor soul, these fifteen years. I shouldnt like to e to that, Sue. I should say that, of all the ways a body might go, the quid the  way might, after all, be best.

    She said it; and then she winked.

    She said it, and seemed to mean it.

    I do sometimes wonder, however, whether she mightnt only have said it to be kind.

    But I didnt think that then. I only rose and kissed her, and made my hair  where she had stroked it loose; and then came the thud of the kit dain, and this time heavier feet upoairs, and then Daintys voice.

    Where are you, Sue? Aint you ing for a dance? Mr Ibbs has got his wind up, were having a right old laugh down here.

    Her shout woke half the babies, and that half woke the other. But

    Mrs Sucksby said that she would see to them, and I went back down, and this time I did dance, with Gentleman as my partner. He held me in a waltz-step. He was drunk and held me tight. John danced again with Dainty, and we bumped about the kit for a half-an-hentleman all the time still calling, Go it, Johnny! and e up, boy! e up!, and Mr Ibbs stopping oo rub a bit of butter on his lips, to keep the whistle sweet.

    day, at midday, was when I left them. I packed all my bits of stuff into the vas-covered trunk and wore the plain brown dress and the cloak and, over my flat hair, a bo. I had learned as much as Gentleman could teach me after three days work. I knew my story and my new name—Susan Smith. There was only one more thing that o be done, and as I sat taking my last meal in that kit—which was bread and dried meat, the meat rather too dried, and ging to my gums—Gentleman did it. He brought from his bag a piece of paper and a pen and some ink, and wrote me out a character.

    He wrote it off in a moment. Of course, he was used to faking papers. He held it up for the ink to dry, then read it out. It began:

    To whom it might . Lady Alice Dunraven, of Whelk Street, May fair, reends Miss Susan Smith—and it went on like that, I fet the rest of it, but it sounded all right to me. He placed it flat again and sig in a ladys curling hand. Then he held it to Mrs Sucksby.

    What do you think, Mrs S? he said, smiling. Will that get Sue her situation?

    But Mrs Sucksby said she couldnt hope to judge it.

    You know best, dear boy, she said, looking away.

    Of course, if we ever took help at Lant Street, it wasnt character we looked for so much as lack of it. There was a little dwarfish girl that used to e sometimes, to boil the babies napkins and to wash the floors; but she was a thief. We couldnt have had ho girls e. They would have seen enough in three minutes of the business of the house to do for us all. We couldnt have had that.

    So Mrs Sucksby waved the paper away, aleman read it through a sed time, then wi me, then folded it and sealed it and put it in my trunk. I swallowed the last of my dried meat and bread, and fastened my cloak. There was only Mrs Sucksby to say good-bye to. John Vroom and Dainty never got up before one. Mr Ibbs was goo crack a safe at Bow: he had kissed my cheek an hour before, and given me a shilling. I put my hat on. It was a dull brown thing, like my dress. Mrs Sucksby set it straight. The her hands to my fad smiled.

    God bless you, Sue! she said. You are making us rich!

    But then her smile grew awful. I had never been parted from her before, for more than a day. She turned away, to hide her falling tears.

    Take her quick, she said to Gentleman. Take her quick, and do me see it!

    And so he put his arm about my shoulders and led me from the house. He found a boy to walk behind us, carrying my trunk. He meant to take me to a cab-stand and drive me to the station at Paddington, and see me on my train.

    The day was a miserable one. Even so, it was not so often I got to cross the water, and I said I should like to walk as far as Southwark Bridge, to look at the view. I had thought I should see all of London from there; but the fog grew thicker the further we went. At the bridge it seemed worst of all. You could see the blae of St Pauls, the barges oer; you could see all the dark things of the city, but not the fair—the fair were lost or made like shadows.

    Queer thing, to think of the river down there, said Gentleman, peering over the edge. He leaned, and spat.

    We had not bargained on the fog. It made the traffic slow to a crawl, and though we found a cab, after twenty minutes we paid the driver off and walked again. I had bee to catch the one oclock train; now, stepping fast across some great square, we heard that hour struck out, and then the quarter, and then the half—all maddeningly damp and half-hearted, they sounded, as if the clap-

    pers and the bells that rung them had been wound about with flan-

    nel.

    Had we not rather turn around, I said, and try again tomorrow?

    But Gentleman said there would be a driver and a trap sent out to Marlow, to meet my train there; and I had better be late, he thought, than not arrive at all.

    But after all, whe to Paddington at last we found the trains all delayed and made slow, just like the traffic: we had to wait another hour then, until the guard should raise the signal that the Bristol train—which was to be my train as far as Maidenhead, where I must get off and join another—was ready to be boarded. We stood beh the tig clock, fidgeting and blowing on our hands. They had lit the great lamps there, but the fog having e in and mixed with the steam, it drifted from arch to ard made the light very poor. The walls were hung with black, from the death of Prince Albert; the crape had got streaked by birds. I thought it very gloomy, for so grand a place. And of course, there was a vast press of people beside us, all waiting and cursing, or jost<big></big>ling by, or letting their children and their dogs run ints.

    Fuck this, said Gentleman in a hard peevish voice, when the wheel of a bath-chair ran over his toe. He stooped to wipe the dust from his boot, then straightened and lit up a cigarette, then coughed. He had his collar turned high and wore a black slouch hat. His eyes were yellow at the whites, as if stained with flip. He did not, at that moment, look like a man a girl would go silly over.

    He coughed again. Fuck this cheap tobacco, too, he said, pulling free a strand that had e loose on his tohen he caught my eye and his face ged. Fuck this cheap life, in all its forms—eh, Suky? No more of that for you and me, soon.

    I looked away from him, saying nothing. I had danced a fast waltz with him the night before; now, away from Lant Street and Mrs Sucksby and Mr Ibbs, amongst all the men and women that were gathered grumbling about us, he seemed just aranger, and I was shy of him. I thought, Youre nothing to me. And again I almost said that we ought to turn round and go home; but I knew

    that if I did he would grow more peevish and show his temper; and so, I did not.

    He finished his smoke, then smoked another. He went off for a piddle, and I went off for a piddle of my own. I heard a whistle blown as I was tidying my skirts; and when I got back, I found the guard had sent out the word and half the crowd had started up and was making in a great sweating rush for the waiting train. We went with them, Gentleman leadio a sed-class coach, then handing up my trunk to the man who was fixing the bags and boxes on the roof. I took a place beside a white-faced woman with a baby on her arm; across from her were two stout farmer-types. I think she was glad to see me get on, for of course, me being dressed so  and ely, she couldnt tell—ha ha!—that I was a thieving Bh girl. Behind me came a boy and his old dad, with a ary in a cage. The boy sat beside the farmers. The old dad sat by me. The coach tilted and creaked, and ut back our heads and stared at the bits of dust and varnish that tumbled from the ceiling where the luggage thumped and slithered about above.

    The door hung open another minute and then was closed. In all the fuss of getting aboard I had hardly looked at Gentleman. He had handed me on, then turo talk with the guard. Now he came to the open window and said,

    Im afraid you may be very late, Sue. But I think the trap will wait for you at Marlow. I am sure it will wait. You must hope that it will

    I k ohat it would not, a a rush of misery and fear. I said quickly,

    e with me, t you? And see me to the house?

    But how could he do that? He shook his head and looked sorry. The two farmer-types, the woman, the boy and the old dad all watched us—w I suppose what house we meant, and what a man in a slouch hat, with a voice like that, was doing talking to a girl like me about it.

    Then the porter climbed down from the roof, there came another whistle, the train gave a horrible lurd began to move off.

    Gentleman lifted up his hat and followed until the e up its speed; then he gave it up—I saw him turn, put his hat ba, twist up his collar. Then he was gohe coach creaked harder and began to sway. The woman and the men put their hands to the leather straps; the boy put his face to the window. The ary put its beak to the bars of its cage. The baby began to cry. It cried for half an hour.

    Aint you got any gin? I said to the woman at last.

    Gin? she said—like I might have said, poison. Then she made a mouth, and showed me her shoulder—not so pleased to have me, sitting by her, the uppity bitch, after all.

    What with her and the baby, and the fluttering bird; and the old dad—who fell asleep and snorted; and the boy—who made paper pellets; and the farmer-types—who smoked and grew bilious; and the fog—that made the train jerk and halt and arrive at Maidewo hours later than its time, so that I missed one Marlow train and must wait for the  one—what with all that, my journey was very wretched. I had nht any food with me, for we had all supposed I should arrive at Briar in time to take a servants tea there. I had not had a morsel sihat dinner of bread and dried meat, at noon: it had stuy gums then, but I should have called it wonderful at Maidenhead, seven hours later. The station there was not like Paddington, where there were coffee-stalls and milk-stalls and a pastry-cooks shop. There was only one place for vittles, and that was shut up and closed. I sat on my trunk. My eyes stung, from the fog. When I blew my nose, I turned a handkerchief black. A man saw me do it. Dont cry, he said, smiling.

    I aint g! I said.

    He wihen asked me my name.

    It was ohing to flirt in town, however. But I wasnt in town now. I wouldnt answer. Wherain came for Marlow I sat at the back of a coach, a at the front, but with his face my way— he tried for an hour to catch my eye. I remembered Dainty saying that she had sat on a train once, with a gentleman near, and he had opened his trousers and showed her his cock, and asked her to hold it; and she had held it, and he had given her a pound. I wondered

    what I would do, if this man asked me to touch his cock—whether I would scream, or look the other way, or touch it, or what.

    But then, I hardly he pound, where I was headed!

    Anyway, money like that was hard to move on. Dainty had never been able to spend hers for fear her father should see it and know shed been gay. She hid it behind a loose bri the wall of the starch works, and put a special mark on the brick, that only she would know. She said she would tell it on her death-bed, and we could use the pound to bury her.

    Well, the man on my train watched me very hard, but if he had his trousers open I never saw; and at last he tilted his hat to me and got off. There were more stops after that, and at every one someone else got off, from further down along the train; and no-o on. The stations grew smaller and darker, until finally there was nothing at them but a tree—there was nothing to see anywhere, but trees, and beyond them bushes, and beyond them fog—grey fog, not brown—with the blaight sky above it. And wherees and the bushes seemed just about at their thickest, and the sky was blacker than I should have thought a sky naturally could be, the train stopped a final time; and that was Marlow.

    Here no-o off save me. I was the last passenger of all. The guard called the stop, and came to lift down my trunk. He said,

    Youll want that carrying. Is there no-one e to meet you?

    I told him there was supposed to be a man with a trap, to take me up to Briar. He said, Did I mearap that came to fetch the post? That would have been and gohree hours before. He looked me over.

    e down from London, have you? he said. Then he called to the driver, who was looking from his cab. Sheve e down from Londo for Briar. I told her, the Briar trap will have e and gone.

    Thatll have e and gohat will, called the driver. Thatll have e and gone, I should say three hours back.

    I stood and shivered. It was colder here than at home. It was colder and darker and the air smelt queer, and the people—didnt I say it?—the people were howling simpletons.

    I said, Aint there a cab-man could take me?

    A cab-man? said the guard. He shouted it to the driver. Wants a cab-man!

    A cab-man!

    They laughed until they coughed. The guard took out a handkerchief and wiped his mouth, saying, Dearie me, oh! dearie, dearie me. A cab-man, at Marlow!

    Oh, fuck off, I said. Fuck off, the pair of you.

    And I caught up my trunk and walked with it to where I could see one or two lights shining, that I thought must be the houses of the village. The guard said, Why, you hussy—! I shall let Mr Way know about you. See what he thinks—ying your London tongue down here—!

    I t say what I meant to do . I did not know how far it was to Briar. I did not even know which road I ought to take. London was forty miles away, and I was afraid of cows and bulls.

    But after all, try roads arent like city ohere are only about four of them, and they all go to the same pla the end. I started to walk, and had walked a minute when there came, behihe sound of hooves and creaking wheels. And then a cart drew alongside me, and the driver pulled up and lifted up a lantern, to look at my face.

    Youll be Susan Smith, he said, e down from London. Miss Maudve beeing after you all day.

    He was an oldish man and his name was William Inker. He was Mr Lillys groom. He took my trunk and helped me into the seat beside his own, and geed up the horse; and when—being struck by the breeze as we drove—he felt me shiver, he reached for a tartan bla for me to put about my legs.

    It was six or seven miles to Briar, aook it at an easy sort of trot, smoking a pipe. I told him about the fog—there was still something of a mist, even now, even there—and the slow trains.

    He said, Thats London. Known for its fogs, aint it? Been much down to the try before?

    Not much, I said.

    Been maiding iy, have you? Good place, your last one? Pretty good, I said.

    Rum way of speaking youve got, for a ladys maid, he said theo France ever?

    I took a sed, smoothing the bla out over my lap. Once or twice, I said.

    Short kind of chaps, the French chaps, I expect? In the leg, I mean.

    Now, I only knew one Fren—a housebreaker, they called him Jack the German, I dont know why. He was tall enough; but I said, to please William Inker, Shortish, I suppose. I expect so, he said.

    The road erfectly quiet and perfectly dark, and I imagihe sound of the horse, and the wheels, and our voices, carrying far across the fields. Then I heard, from rather near, the slow tolling of a bell—a very mournful sound, it seemed to me at that moment, not like the cheerful bells of London. It tolled imes.

    Thats the Briar bell, sounding the hour, said William Inker. We sat in sileer that, and in a little time we reached a high stone Wall and took a road that ran beside it. Soon the wall became a great arch, and then I saw behind it the roof and the pointed windows of a greyish house, half-covered with ivy. I thought it a grand enough crib, but not so grand nor so grim perhaps as Gentleman had pai. But when William Inker slowed the horse and I put the bla from me and reached for my trunk, he said,

    Wait up, sweetheart, weve half a mile yet! And then, to a man who had appeared with a lantern at the door of the house, he called: Good night, Mr Mack. You may shut the gate behind us. Here is Miss Smith, look, safe at last.

    The building I had thought was Briar was only the lodge! I stared, saying nothing, and we drove on past it, between two rows of bare dark trees, that curved as the road curved, then dipped into a kind of hollow, where the air—that had seemed to clear a little, on the open try lanes—grew thick again. So thick it grew, I felt it, damp, upon my face, upon my lashes and lips; and closed my eyes.

    Then the dampness passed away. I looked, and stared again. The road had risen, we had broken out from between the lines of trees into a gravel clearing, and here—rising vast and straight and stark out of the woolly fog, with all its windows black or shuttered, and its walls with a dead kind of ivy ging to them, and a couple of its eys sending up threads of a feeble-looking grey smoke—here was Briar, Maud Lillys great house, that I must now call my home.

    We did not cross before the face of it, but kept well to the side, then took up a lahat swung round behind it, where there was a muddle of yards and out-houses and porches, and more dark walls and shuttered windows and the sound of barking dogs. High in one of the buildings was the round white fad great black hands of the clock I had heard striking across the fields. Beh it, William Inker pulled the horse up, then helped me down. A door ened in one of the walls and a woman stood gazing at us, her arms folded against the cold.

    Theres Mrs Stiles, heard the trap e, said William. We crossed the yard to join her. Up above us, at a little window, I thought I saw a dle-flame shine, and flutter, and then go out.

    The door led to a passage, and this led to a great, bright kit, about five times the size of our kit at Lant Street, and with pots set in rows upon a whitewashed wall, and a few rabbits hanging on hooks from the beams of the ceiling. At a wide scrubbed table sat a boy, a woman and three or firls—of course, they looked very hard at me. The girls studied my bo and the y cloak. Their frocks and aprons being only servants wear, I didnt trouble myself to study them.

    Mrs Stiles said, Well, youre about as late as you could be. Any longer and you shouldve had to stay at the village. We keep early hours here.

    She was about fifty, with a white cap with frills and a way of not quite looking in your eye as she spoke to you. She carried keys about her, on a  at her waist. Plain, old-fashioned keys, I could have copied any one of them.

    I made her half a curtsey. I did not say—which I might have— that she should be thankful I had not turned back at Paddington;

    that I wished I had turned back; and that for ao have had the time that I had had, in trying to get forty miles from London, perhaps went to prove that London was to be left—I did not say that. What I said was:

    Im sure, Im very grateful that the trap was sent at all. The girls at the table tittered to hear me speak. The woman who sat with them—the cook, it turned out—got up a about making me a supper-tray. William Inker said,

    Miss Smithve e from a pretty fine pla London, Mrs Stiles. And sheve been several times in France. Has she, said Mrs Stiles.

    Only one or two times, I said. Now everyone would suppose I had been boasting.

    She said the chaps there are very short in the leg. _ Mrs Stiles gave a nod. The girls at the table tittered again, and one of them whispered something that made the boy grow red. But then my tray was made, and Mrs Stiles said,

    Margaret, you  carry this through to my pantry. Miss Smith, I suppose I should take you to where you might splash your hands and face.

    I took this to mean that she would show me to the privy, and I said I wished she would. She gave me a dle and took me down another short passage, to another yard, that had ah closet in it with paper on a spike.

    Theook me to her own little room. It had a ey-piece with white wax flowers on it, and a picture of a sailor in a frame, that I supposed was Master Stiles, gone off to Sea; and anoth<samp>藏书网</samp>er picture, of an angel, doirely in black hair, that I presumed was Mr Stiles, gone off to Glory. She sat and watched me take my supper. It was mutton, minced, and bread-and-butter; and you may imagihat, being so hungry as I was, I made very short work of it. As I ate, there came the slow chiming of the clock that I had heard before, sounding half-past nine. I said, Does the clock chime all night?

    Mrs Stiles nodded. All night, and all day, at the hour and the half. Mr Lilly likes his days run very regular. Youll find that out.

    And Miss Lilly? I said, pig crumbs from the er of my mouth. What does she like?

    She smoothed her apron. Miss Maud likes what her uncle likes, she answered.

    Then she rearranged her lips. She said,

    Youll know, Miss Smith, that Miss Maud is quite a young girl, for all that shes mistress of this great house. The servants dont trouble her, for the servants ao me. I should have said I had been a housekeeper long enough to know how to secure a maid for my own mistress—but there, even a housekeeper must do as she is bid, and Miss Maudve gone quite over my head in this matter. Quite over my head. I shouldnt have thought that perfectly wise, in a girl of her years; but we shall see how it turns out.

    I said, I am sure whatever Miss Lilly does must turn out well.

    She said, I have a great staff of servants, to make sure that it does. Thisis a well-kept house, Miss Smith, and I hope you will take to it. I dont know what you might be used to in your last place. I dont know what might be sidered a ladys maids duties, in London. I have never been there—she had never been to London!—so ot say. But if you mind my irls, then I am sure they will mind you. The men and the stable-boys, of course, I hope I shall never see you talking with more than you  help

    She went on like that for a quarter of an hour—all the time, as I have mentioned, never quite catg my eye. She told me where I might walk in the house, and where I must take my meals, and how much sugar I should be allowed for my own use, and how much beer, and when I could expect my underclothes lauhe tea that was boiled in Miss Mauds teapot, she said, it had been the habit of the last ladys maid to pass on to the girls i. Likewise the wax-ends from Miss Mauds dle-sticks: they were to be given to Mr Way. And Mr Way would know how many wax-ends to expect, si was him who doled out the dles. Corks went to Charles, the knife-boy. Bones and skio Cook.

    The pieces of soap that Miss Maud leaves in her wash-stand, however, she said, as being too dry to raise a lather from: those you may keep.

    Well, thats servants for you—always grubbing over their own little patch. As if I cared, about dle-ends and soap! If I had never quite felt it before, I khen what it was, to be in expectations of three thousand pounds.

    Then she said that if I had finished my supper she would be pleased to show me to my room. But she would have to ask me to be very quiet as we went, for Mr Lilly liked a silent house and couldnt bear upset, and Miss Maud had a set of hat were just like his, that wouldnt allow of her bei from her rest or made fretful.

    So she said; and theook up her lamp, and I took up my dle, and she led me out into the passage and up a dark staircase. This is the servants way, she said, as we walked, that you must always take, unless Miss Maud directs you otherwise.

    Her void her tread grew softer the higher we went. At last, when we had climbed three pairs of stairs, she took me to a door, that she said in a whisper was the door to my room. Putting her finger before her lips, she slowly turhe handle.

    I had never had a room of my own before. I did not particularly want one, now. But, since I must have ohis one I supposed would do. It was small and plain—would have looked better, perhaps, for a paper garland or two, or a few plaster dogs. But there was a looking-glass upon the mantel and, before the fire, a rug. Beside the bed—William Inker must have brought it up—was my vas trunk.

    he head of the bed there was another door, shut quite tight and with no key in it. Where does that lead? I asked Mrs Stiles, thinking it might lead to another passage or a closet.

    Thats the door to Miss Mauds room, she said.

    I said, Miss Maud is through there, asleep in her bed?

    Perhaps I said it rather loud; but Mrs Stiles gave a shudder, as if I might just have shrieked or sprung a rattle.

    Miss Maud sleeps very poorly, she answered quietly. If she wakes in the night, then she likes her girl to go to her. She wont call out for you, since you are a strao her noill put Margaret in a chair outside her door, and Margaret shall take her

    her breakfast tomorrow, and dress her for the day. After that, you ust be ready to be called in and examined. She said she hoped Miss Maud would find me pleasing. I said I

    did, too.

    She left me, then. She went very softly, but at the door she paused, to put her hand to the keys at her . I saw her do it, and grew quite cold: for she looked all at once like nothing so much as the matron of a gaol. I said, before I could stop myself:

    Youre not going to lock me in?

    Lock you in? she answered, with a frown. Why should I do

    that?

    I said I didnt know. She looked me over, drew in her , then shut the door a me.

    I held up my thumb. Kiss that! I thought.

    Then I sat upon the bed. It was hard. I wondered if the sheets and blas had been ged sihe last maid left with the scarlatina. It was too dark to see. Mrs Stiles had taken her lamp and I had set my dle down in a draught: the flame of it plunged about and made great black shadows. I unfastened my cloak, but kept it draped about my shoulders. I ached, from the cold and the travelling; and the mince I had eaten had e too late—it sat in my stomad hurt. It was ten oclock. We laughed at people who went to bed before midnight, at home.

    I might as well have been put in gaol, I thought. A gaol would have been livelier. Here, there was only an awful silence: you listened, and it troubled your ears. And when you got up ao the window and looked outside, you nearly faio see how high you were, and how dark were the yard and the stables, how still and quiet the land beyond.

    I remembered the dle I had seen, fluttering at a window as I walked with William Inker. I wondered whi it was that that light had shone from.

    I opened my trunk, to look at all the things that I had brought with me from Lant Street—but then, none of them were really mihey were only the petticoats and shimmies that Gentleman had made me take. I took off my dress, and for a sed held it

    against my face. The dress was not miher; but I found the seams that Dainty had made, and smelled them. I thought that her needle had left the st there, of John Vrooms dog-skin coat.

    I thought of the soup that Mrs Sucksby would have made, from the bones of that pigs head; and it was quite as strange as I k would be, to imagihem all sittiing it, perhaps thinking of me, perhaps thinking of something else entirely.

    If I had been a g sort of girl, I should certainly have cried then, imagining that.

    But I was never a girl for tears. I ged into my nightgown, put my cloak ba above it, and stood in my stogs and my unbuttoned shoes. I looked at the shut door at the head of the bed, and at the key-hole in it. I wondered if Maud kept a key on her side and-had it turned. I wondered what I would see, if I went a and looked—and who  think a thing like that, and not go and do it? But when I did go, on tiptoe, and stoop to the lock, I saw a dim light, a shadow—nothing clearer than that, no sign of any kind of sleeping or wakeful or fretful girl, or anything.

    I wohough, if I might hear her breathing. I straightened up, and held my breath, and put my ear flat to the door. I heard my heart-beat, and the r of my blood. I heard a small, tight sound, that must have been the creeping of a worm or a beetle in the wood.

    Beyond that, there was nothing—though I listened for a minute, maybe two. Then I gave it up. I took off my shoes and my garters and got into bed: the sheets were cold a damp, like sheets of pastry. I put my cloak over the bed-clothes—for extra warmth; and also so that I might quickly seize it, if someone came at me in the night and I wao run. You never khe dle I left burning. If Mr Way was to plain that that was oub less, too bad.

    Even a thief has her oints. The shadows still danced about. The pastry sheets stayed cold. The great clock sounded half-past ten—eleven—half-past eleven—twelve. I lay and shivered, and longed with all my heart for Mrs Sucksby, Lant Street, home.

 Chapter Three

    They woke me at six in the m. It seemed still the middle of the night to me, for my dle of course had buro nothing, and the window-curtains were heavy ahe thin light out. When the maid, Margaret, came knog at my door, I thought I was in my old room at Lant Street. I was sure she was a thief, broke out from gaol and needing her fetters filed free by Mr Ibbs. That happened, sometimes; and sometimes the thieves were kind men, who knew us, and sometimes they were desperate villains. Once a man put a ko Mr Ibbss throat, because he said the file went too slow. So, hearing Margarets knoow, I started from the bed, g out, Oh! Hold!—though what I meant to be held, and who ought to have do, I could not tell you; aher, I suppose, could Margaret. She put her face about the door, whispering, Did you call, miss? She had a jug of warm water for me, and she came a my fire; then she reached beh the bed and took the chamber-pot, aied it into her bucket of

    slops, and wiped it  with a damp cloth that hung against her apron.

    I had used to wash the chamber-pots, at home. Now, seeing Margaret tip my piddle into her bucket, I was not sure I liked it. But I said, Thank you, Margaret—then wished I hadnt; for she heard it and tossed her head, as if to say, Who did I think I was, thanking her?

    Servants. She said I should take my breakfast in Mrs Stiless pantry. Theurned a me—getting a quick look, I thought, at my frod my shoes and my open trunk, on the way.

    I waited for the fire to take, then rose and dressed. It was too cold to wash. My gow clammy. When I drew the window-curtain bad let the daylight in, I saw—what I had not been able to see the night before, by the dle—that the ceiling was streaked brown with damp, and the wood at the walls stained white.

    From the -door room there came the murmur of voices. I heard Margaret saying, Yes, miss. Then there was the shutting of a door.

    Then there was silence. I went down to my breakfast—first losing my way among the dark passages at the bottom of the servants stairs, and finding myself in the yard with the privy in it. The privy, I saas surrounded by les, and the bricks in the yard broken up with weeds. The walls of the house had ivy on them, and some of the windows wanted panes. Gentleman was right, after all, about the place being hardly worth crag. He was right, too, about the servants. When I found Mrs Stiless pantry at last there was a man there, dressed in breeches and silk stogs, and with a wig on his head with powder on it. That was Mr Way. He had been steward to Mr Lilly for forty-five years, he said; and he looked it. When a girl brought the breakfasts, he was served first. We had gammon and an egg, and a cup of beer. They had beer with all their meals there, there was a whole room where it was brewed. And they say Londoners  lush!

    Mr Way said hardly a word to me, but spoke to Mrs Stiles about the running of the house. He asked only after the family I was supposed to have just left; and when I told him, the Dunravens, of

    Whelk Street, Mayfair, he nodded and looked clever, sayihought he kheir man. Which goes to show you what a humbug he was.

    He went off at seven. Mrs Stiles would not leave the table before he got up. When she did she said,

    You will be glad to hear, Miss Smith, that Miss Maud slept well.

    I didnt know what to say to that. She went on, anyway:

    Miss Maud rises early. She has asked that you be sent to her. Should you like to wash your hands before you go up? Miss Maud is like her uncle, and particular.

    My hands seemed  enough to me; but I washed them anyway, in a little stone sink she had there in the er of her pantry.

    I felt the beer I had drunk, and wished I had not drunk it. I wished I had used the privy when I came across it in the yard. I was certain I should never find my way to it again.

    I was nervous.

    She took me up. We went, as before, by the servants stairs, but then struck out into a handsomer passage, that led to one or two doors. At one of these she knocked. I didnt catch the ahat came, but suppose she heard it. She straightened her bad turhe iron handle, and led me in.

    The room was a dark one, like all the rooms there. Its walls were panelled all over in an old black wood, and its floor—which was bare, but for a couple of trifling Turkey carpets, that were here and there worn to the weave—was also black. There were some great heavy tables about, and one or two hard sofas. There ainting of a brown hill, and a vase full of dried leaves, and a dead snake in a glass case with a white egg in its mouth. The windows showed the grey sky and bare wet brahe window-panes were small, and leaded, and rattled in their frames.

    There was a little spluttering fire in a vast old grate, and before this—standing gazing into the weak flames and the smoke, but turning as she heard my step, and starting, and blinking—there was Miss Maud Lilly, the mistress of the house, that all our plot was built on.

    I had expected her, from all that Gentleman had said, to be quite out of the way handsome. But she was not that—at least, I did not think her so as I studied her then, I thought her looks rather onplace. She was taller than me by an inch or two—which is to say, of an ordinary height, since I am sidered short; and her hair was fairer than mi not very fair—and her eyes, which were brown, were lighter. Her lip and her cheek were very plump and smooth—she did lick me there, I will admit, for I liked to bite my own lip, and my cheeks had freckles, and my features as a rule were said to be sharp. I was also thought young-looking; but as to that—well, I should have liked the people who thought it to have studied Maud Lilly as she stood before me now. For if I was young, then she was an infant, she was a chick, she igeon that knew nothing. She saw me e, and started, as I have said; and she took a step or two to meet me, and her pale cheek fired up crimson. Theopped, and put her hands before her, ly, at her skirt. The skirt—I had never seen such a thing before, on a girl her age— the skirt was full and short and showed her ankles; and about her waist—that was astonishingly narrow—there was a sash. Her hair was caught in a  of velvet. On her feet were slippers, of red prunella. Her hands had  white gloves upon them, buttoned up tight at the wrist. She said,

    Miss Smith. You are Miss Smith, I think? And you have e to be my maid, from London! And may I call you Susan? I hope you shall like it at Briar, Susan; and I hope you shall like me. There is not much to like, iher case. I think you might do it very easily— very easily, indeed.

    She spoke in a soft, sweet, halting voice, tilting her head, hardly looking at me, still quite crimson at the cheek. I said, I am sure I shall like you, miss. Then I remembered all my work at Lant Street, and gripped my skirt and made a curtsey. And when I rose from it she smiled, and came and took my hand in hers.

    She looked at Mrs Stiles, who had kept behi the door.

    You need not stay, Mrs Stiles, she said nicely. But you will have been kind to Miss Smith, I know. She caught my eye. Youve heard, perhaps, that I am an orphan, Susan, like you. I came to

    Briar as a child: very young, and with no-o all to care for me. I ot tell you all the ways in which Mrs Stiles has made me know what a mothers love is, sihat time.

    She smiled and tilted her head. Mrs Stiles would not catch her

    gaze, but a bit of colour struggled into her cheeks, and her eye-lids fluttered. I should never have put her down as the motherly sort, myself; but servants grow seal over the swells they work for, like dogs grow fond of bullies. You take my word for it.

    Anyway, she blinked and looked modest ano<u></u>ther minute; and then she left us. Maud smiled again, and led me to one of the hard-backed sofas, that was close to the fire. She sat beside me. She asked after my journey—We supposed you lost! she said—and after my room. Did I like my bed? Did I like my breakfast?

    And have you really, she said, e from London? That was all that anyone had been asking, since I left Lant Street—as if I might have e from anywhere else! But then again, I thought she asked it in a different sort of way: not in a gaping try way, but in a notig, hungryish manner—as if London was something to her, and she loo hear of it.

    Of course, I thought I knew why that was.

    she told me all the duties I should have to do, while I was her maid: the chief of these being, as I also ko sit with her and keep her pany, and walk with her about the park, and tidy her gowns. She lowered her eyes.

    Youll see we are rather out of the way of fashion, here at Briar, she said. It matters little, I suppose, since we have so few callers. My uncle only likes to see me . But you, of course, will be used to the great styles of London.

    I thought of Daintys hair, Johns dog-skin coat. Pretty used, I said.

    And your last mistress, she went on then, she was quite a fine lady? She would laugh to look at me, I expect!

    She coloured still harder as she said that, and again looked from me; and again I thought, You pigeon!

    But what I said was, that Lady Alice—who was the mistress that Gentleman had faked up for me—was too kind to laugh at anyone,

    and would anyway know that grand clothes meant nothing, si was the person ihe clothes that ought to be judged. All in all, I thought, it retty clever thing to say; and she seemed to think so too, for when I had said it she looked at me in a new way and her colour went down, and she took my hand again, saying, You are a good girl, Susan, I think. I said, Lady Alice always said so, miss.

    Then I remembered the character that Gentleman had written for me, and thought this might be the moment to present it. I took it from my pocket and ha over. She rose and broke the wax, then walked to the window to hold the paper to the light. She stood a long time looking at the curling hand, and oneaked a gla me; and my heart beat a little fast then, to think she might have noticed something queer there. But it was not that: for I saw at last that her hand, which held the paper, trembled; and I guessed that she had no more idea what a proper character was like than I did, and was only figuring out what she should say.

    I thought it almost a shame, guessing that, that she had no mother.

    Well, she said, folding the paper very small and putting it inside her own pocket, Lady Alice does indeed speak highly of you. I think you must have been sorry to leave her house.

    Pretty sorry, miss, I said. But then, you see, Lady Alice has goo India. I think I should have found the sun there rather fierce.

    She smiled. Will you prefer the grey skies of Briar? You know, the sun never shines here. My uncle has forbidden it. Strong light, you see, fades print.

    She laughed and showed her teeth, which were small and very white. I smiled, but kept my lips shut—for my owh, that are yelloere I am afraid to say quite yellow even then; and seeing hers made me fancy them yellower.

    She said, You know my uncle is a scholar, Susan? I said, I heard it, miss.

    He keeps a great library. The largest library, of its kind, in all of England. I dare say you will see it soon.

    That will be something, miss, Im sure.

    She smiled again. You like to read, of course?

    I swallowed. To read, miss? She nodded, waiting. Pretty much, I said at last. That is, I am sure I should, if I was ever mu the way of books and papers. By which I mean—I coughed—if I was to be shown.

    She stared.

    To learn, I mean, I said.

    She stared, even harder; and then she gave a short, disbelieving sort of laugh. You are joking, she said. You dont mean, you ot read? Not really? Not a word, not a letter? Her smile became a frown. There was, beside her, a little table with a book upon it. Still half smiling, half frowning, she took the book up and ha to me. Go on, she said kindly. I think you are being modest. Read me any part, I shant mind if you stumble.

    I held the book, saying nothing; but beginning to sweat. I ope and looked at a page. It was full of a close black print. I tried ahat one was worse. I felt Mauds gaze, like a flame against my hot face. I felt the silence. My face grew hotter. Take a ce, I thought.

    Our Father, I tried, which art in heaven—

    But then, I fot the rest. I closed the book, and bit my lip, and looked at the floor. I thought, very bitterly, Well, here will all our scheming end. She wont want a maid that t read her a book, or write fancy letters in a curling hand! I lifted my eyes to hers and said,

    I might be taught it, miss. I am that willing. Im sure I could learn, in half a wink—

    But she was shaking her head, and the look on her face was something.

    Be taught? she said, ing close aly taking back the book. Oh, no! No, no, I shouldnt allow it. Not read! Ah, Susan, were you to live in this house, as the niey uncle, you should know what that meant. You should know, indeed!

    She smiled. And while she still held my gaze, still smiling, there came the slow and heavy tolling of the great house-bell, eight times; and then her smile fell.

    Now, she said, turning away, I must go to Mr Lilly; and when the clock strikes one I shall be free again.

    She said that—sounding, I thought, just like a girl in a story. Arent there stories, with girls with magicles—wizards, beasts, and whatnots? She said,

    e to me, Susan, at my uncles chamber, at one.

    I will, miss, I said.

    She was looking about her, now, in a distracted kind of way. There was a glass above the fire and she went to it, and put her gloved hands to her face, and then to her collar. I watched her lean. Her shown lifted at the bad showed her calves.

    She caught my eye in the glass. I made another curtsey.

    Shall I go, miss? I said.

    She stepped back. Stay, she said, waving her hand, and put my rooms in order, will you?

    She went to the door. At the handle, however, she stopped. She said,

    I hope you will be happy here, Susan. Now she was blushing again. My own cheek cooled, when I saw that. I hope your aunt, in London, will not miss you too greatly. It was an aunt, I think, that Mr Rivers mentioned? She lowered her eyes. I hope you found Mr Rivers quite well, when you saw him?

    She let the question fall, like it was nothing to her; and I knew fidence men who did the same, dropping One good shilling among a pile of so make all the s seem ho. As if she gave a fig, for me and my old aunty!

    I said, He was very well, miss. A his pliments.

    She had opehe door now, and half-hid herself behind it. Did he truly? she said.

    Truly, miss.

    She put her brow against the wood. I think he is kind, she said softly.

    I remembered him squatting at the side of that kit chair, his hand reag high beh the layers of petticoat, saying, You sweet bitch.

    Im sure hes very kind, miss, I said.

    Then, from somewhere in the house there came the quick, peevish tinkling of a little hand-bell, and, Theres Uncle! she cried, gazing over her shoulder. She turned and ran, leaving the door half-closed. I heard the slap of her slippers and the creaking of the stairs as she went down.

    I waited a sed, then stepped to the door, put my foot to it, and kicked it shut. I went to the fire and warmed my hands. I do not think I had been quite warm since leaving Lant Street. I lifted my head and, seeing the glass that Maud had looked in, rose and gazed at my own face—at my freckled cheek and my teeth. I showed myself my tohen I rubbed my hands and chuckled: for she was just as Gentleman had promised, and clearly tit over heels in love with him already; and that three thousand pounds might as well have been ted and ed and had my  on it, and the doctor be standing ready with a strait-coat at the madhouse door.

    Thats what I thought, after seeihen.

    But I thought it in a distented sort of way; and the chuckle, I have to admit, was rather forced. I could not have said quite why, though. I supposed it was the gloom—for the house seemed darker and stiller than ever, now that she had gonebbr></abbr>. There was only the dropping of ash in the grate, the bumping and rattling of panes of glass. I went to the window. The draught was awful. There had been little red sand-bags laid upon the sills to keep it out, but they didnt work; and they had all got wet, and were mouldy. I put my hand to one, and my finger came away green. I stood and shivered, and looked at the view—if you could call it a view, that was just plain grass and trees. A few black birds pulled worms from the lawn. I wondered which way London was.

    I wished hard to hear an infant cry, or Mr Ibbss sister. I would have given five pounds for a parcel of poke or a few bad s to tarnish.

    Then I thought of something else. Put my rooms in order, Maud had said; and here was only one room, that I supposed must be her parlour; so somewhere else must be another, where she slept in her bed. Now, the walls in that house were all of dark oak panelling,

    very gloomy on the eye and very baffling, for the doors were set so pat in their frames, you could not spot them. But I looked hard and, in the wall across from where I stood, I saw a crack, and then a handle; and then the shape of the door sprung at me, plain as daylight.

    It was the door to her bedroom, just as I had supposed; and of course, this room had another door in it, that was the door to my own room, where I had stood the night before and listened for her breaths. That seemed a very foolish thing to have done, now that I saw what was oher side of it. For it was only an ordinary ladys room—not very grand, but grand enough, with a faint, sweet smell to it, and a high four-posted bed with curtains and a opy of old moreen. I was not sure that sleeping in a bed like that wouldnt make me sneeze: I thought of all the dust and dead flies and spiders that must be gathered in the opy, that looked as though it hadaken down in y years. The bed had been made, but a night-dress lay upon it—I folded this up and put it beh the pillow; and there were one or two fair hairs there that I caught up and took to the grate. So muaiding. Upon the ey-breast there was a great aged looking-glass, shot through like marble, with silver and grey. Beyond it was a small old-fashioned press, that was carved all over with flowers and grapes, quite black with polish, and here and there split. I should say that ladies wore nothing but leaves in the day it was built, for it had six or seven slight gowns laid carelessly in it now, that made the shelves groan, and a oline cage, against which the doors could not be fastened. Seeing that, I thought again what a shame it was that Maud had no mother: for she would certainly have got rid of a stuff like this and found her daughter something more up to the minute and dainty.

    But ohing a business like ours at Lant Street teaches you is, the proper handling of quality goods. I got hold of the gowns—they were all as odd and short and girlish as each other—and shook them out, then laid them nicely ba their shelf. Then I wedged a shoe against the olio hold it flat; after that, the doors closed as they were meant to. This press was in one alcove. In another was a

    dressing-table. That was strewn about with brushes and bottles

    and pinst—I tidied those, too—and fitted beh with a set of fancy

    drawers. I opehem up. They held—well, here was a thing. Thev all held gloves. Mloves than a milliners. White ones, iop drawer; black silk ones in the middle; and buff mittens in

    the lowest.

    They were each of them marked on the i the wrist with a crimson thread that I guessed spelled out Mauds name. I should have liked to have a go at that, with scissors and a pin.

    I did no such thing, of course, but left the gloves all lyily, and I went about the room again until I had touched and studied it all There was not much more to look at; but there was one more curious thing, and that was a little wooden box, inlaid with ivory, that sat upon a table beside her bed.

    The box was locked, and when I took it up it gave a dull sort of rattle. There was no key handy: I guessed she kept it somewhere about her, perhaps on a string. The lock was a simple one, however, and with locks like that, you only have to show them the wire and they open themselves, its like giving brio an oyster. I used one of her hairpins.

    The wood turned out to be lined with plush. The hinge was of silver, and oiled not to squeak. I am not sure what I thought to find in there—perhaps, something from Gentleman, some keepsake, some letter, some little bill-and-coo. But what there was, was a miniature portrait, in a frame of gold hung on a faded ribbon, of a handsome, fair-haired lady. Her eyes were kind. She was dressed in a style from twenty years before, and the frame was an old one: she did not look much like Maud, but I thought it a pretty safe bet that she was her mother.—Though I also thought that, if she was, then it was queer that Maud kept her picture locked up in a box, and did not wear it.

    I puzzled so long over this, turning the picture, looking for marks, that the frame—which had been cold when I took it up, like everything there—grew warm. But then there came a sound, from somewhere in the house, and I thought how it would be, if Maud— or Margaret, or Mrs Stiles—should e to the room and catch me

    standing by the open box, the portrait in my hand. I quickly laid it ba its place, and made it fast again.

    The hairpin I had bent to make a pick-lock with, I kept. I shouldnt have liked Maud to have found it and thought me a thief.

    There was nothing to do, after I had dohat. I stood some more at the window. At eleven oclock a maid brought up a tray. Miss Maud isnt here, I said, when I saw the silver tea-pot; but the tea was for me. I drank it in fairy-sips, to make it last the lohen I took the tray back down, thinking to save the maid another journey. When they saw me carrying it into the kit, however, the girls there stared and the cook said,

    Well, I never! If you think Margaret aint quiough ing, you must speak to Mrs Stiles. But Im sure, Miss Fee never called anyone idle.

    Miss Fee was the Irish maid who had got sick with the scarlatina. It seemed very cruel to be supposed prouder than her, when I was only trying to be kind.

    But I said nothing. I thought, Miss Maud likes me, if you dont! For she was the only one, of all of them, to have spared me a pleasant word; and suddenly I longed for the time to pass, not for its own sake, but as it would take me back to her.

    At least at Briar you always knew what hour it was. The twelve struck, and then the half, and I made my way to the back-stairs and hung about there until one of the parlourmaids went by, and she showed me the way to the library. It was a room on the first floor, that you reached from a gallery overlooking a great wood staircase and a hall; but it was all dark and dim and shabby, as it was everywhere in that house—you would never have thought, looking about you there, that you were right in the home of a tremendous scholar. By the door to the library, on a wooden shield, hung some creatures head with one glass eye: I stood and put my fio its little white teeth, waiting to hear the clock sound ohrough the door came Mauds voice—very faint, but slow and level, as though she might be reading to her uncle from a book.

    Then the hour sounded, and I lifted my hand and knocked. A mans thin voice called out for me to enter.

    I saw Maud first: she was sitting at a desk with a book before her, her hands upon the covers. Her hands were bare, she had her little white gloves laid ly by, but she sat beside a shaded lamp, that threw all its light upon her fingers, and they seemed pale as ashes upon the page of print. Above her was a window. Its glass had yellow paint upon it. All about her, over all the walls of the room, were shelves; and the shelves had books on—you never saw so many. A stunning amount. How many stories does one man need? I looked at them and shuddered. Maud rose, closing the book that was before her. She took up the white gloves and drew them ba.

    She looked tht, to the end of the room that, because of the open door, I could not see. A cross voice said,

    What is it?

    I pushed the door further, and saw another painted window, more shelves, more books, and a-sed great desk. This one iled with papers, and had another shaded lamp. Behind it sat Mr Lilly, Mauds old uncle; and to describe him as I saw him then, is to tell everything.

    He wore a velvet coat, and a velvet cap, that had a stub of red wool jutting from it where a tassel might once have hung. In his hand there en, that he held clear of the paper; and the hand itself was dark, as Mauds was fair—for it was stained all over with India ink, like a regular mans might be stained with tobacco. His hair, however, was white. His  was shaved bare. His mouth was small and had no colour, but his tohat was hard and pointed—was almost black, from where he must have given a lick to his finger and thumb, when turning pages.

    His eyes were damp and feeble. Before them he had a pair of glasses, shaded green. He saw me and said,

    Who the devil are you?

    Maud worked at the buttons at her wrist.

    This is my new maid, Uncle, she said quietly. Miss Smith.

    Behind Mr Lillys green glasses, I saw his eyes screw themselves up and groer.

    Miss Smith, he said, looking at me but talking to his niece. Is she a papist, like the last one?

    I dont know, said Maud. I have not asked her. Are you a papist, Susan?

    I didnt know what that was. But I said, No, miss. I dont think so.

    Mr Lilly at o his hand across his ear.

    I dont care for her voice, he said. t she be silent? t she be soft?

    Maud smiled. She , Uncle, she said.

    Then why is she here, disturbing me now?

    She has e to fetch me.

    To fetch you? he said. Did the clock sound?

    He put his hand to the fob of his waistcoat and drew out an a great gold repeater, tilting his head to catch the chime, and opening his mouth. I looked at Maud, who stood, still fumbling with the fastening of her glove; and I took a step, meaning to help her. But when he saw me do that, the old man jerked like Mr Pun the puppet-show, and out came his black tongue.

    The finger, girl! he cried. The fihe finger!

    He held his own dark fio me, and shook his pen until the ink flew: I saw later that the piece of carpet underh his desk was quite black, and so guessed he shook his pen rather often. But at that moment he looked se, and spoke so shrilly, my heart quite failed me. I thought he must be proo fits. I took aep, and that made him shriek still harder—at last Maud came to me and touched my arm.

    Dont be afraid, she said softly. He means only this, look. And she showed me how, at my feet, there was set into the dark floorboards, in the space between the doorway and the edge of the carpet, a flat brass hand with a pointing finger.

    Uncle does not care to have servants eyes upon his books, she said, for fear of spoiling them. Uncle asks that no servant advance further into the room than this mark here.

    She placed the toe of her slipper upon the brass. Her face was smooth as wax, her voice like water.

    Does she see it? said her uncle.

    Yes  she answered, drawing back her toe. She sees it very well. She will know ime—shant you, Susan?

    Yes, miss, I said—hardly knowing what I should say, or how or who I should look at; for it was certainly o me, that gazing at a line of print could spoil it. But what did I know, about that? Besides which, the old man was so queer, and had given me such a turn, I thought that anything might have been true. Yes, miss, I said, a sed time; and then: Yes, sir.

    Then I made a curtsey. Mr Lilly snorted, looking hard at me through his green glasses. Maud fastened her glove, auro leave him.

    Make her soft, Maud, he said, as she pulled the door behind us.

    I will, Uncle, she murmured.

    Now the passage seemed dimmer than ever. She took me round the gallery and up the staircase to the sed floor, where her rooms were. Here there was a bit of lunch laid out, and coffee in another silver pot; but when she saw what Cook had sent up, she made a face.

    Eggs, she said. Done soft, like you must be. What did you think of my uncle, Susan?

    I said, Im sure hes very clever, miss.

    He is.

    And writing, I believe, a great big diary?

    She blihen nodded. A diary, yes. A great many years labour. resently at F.

    She held my gaze, as if to see what I thought of that.

    Astonishing, I said.

    She blinked again, then put a spoon to the side of the first of the eggs and took its head off. Then she looked at the white and yellow mess i and made another face, and put it from her. You must eat this for me, she said. You must eat them all. And I shall have the bread-and-butter.

    There were three eggs there. I dont know what she saw io be so choosy over. She passed them to me and, as I ate them, she sat watg me, taking bites of bread and sips of coffee, and once

    rubbing for a mi a spot upon her glove, saying, Here is a drop of yolk, look, e upon my finger. Oh, how horrid the yellow is, against the white!

    I saw her frowning at that mark, then, until the meal was finished. When Margaret came to take the tray away, she rose a into her bedroom; and when she came back her gloves were white again—she had been to her drawer and got a new pair. The old ones I found later, as I put coal on her bedroom fire: she had cast them there, at the back of the grate, and the flames had made the kid shrink, they looked like gloves for a doll.

    She was certainly, then, what you would call inal. But was she mad, or even half-way simple, as Gentleman said at Lant Street? I did not think so, then. I thought her only pretty lonely, and pretty bookish and bored—as who wouldnt be, in a house like that? When we had finished our lunch she went to the window: the sky was grey and threatening rain, but she said she had a fancy to go out walking. She said, Now, what shall I wear for it?, aood at the door of her little black press, looking over her coats, her bos and her boots. That killed nearly an hour. I think thats why she did it. When I was clumsy over the lag of her shoe, she put her hands upon mine and said,

    Be slower. Why should we hurry? There is no-oo hurry for, is there?

    She smiled, but her eyes were sad. I said, No, miss.

    In the end she put on a pale grey cloak, and over her gloves she drew mittens. She had a little leather bag kept ready, that held a handkerchief, a bottle of water, and scissors: she had me carry this, not saying what the scissors were for—I supposed she meant to cut flowers. She took me down the great staircase to the door, and Mr Way heard us and came running to throw back the bolts. How do you do, Miss Maud? he said, making a bow; and then: And you, Miss Smith. The hall was dark. When we went outside we stood blinking, our hands at our eyes against the sky and the watery sun. The house had seemed grim when I first saw it, at night, in the

    fog and I should like to say it seemed less grim when you saw it by daylight; but it seemed worse. I suppose it had been grand enough once, but now its eys were leaning like drunks, and its roof was green with moss and birds s. It was covered all over with a dead kind of creeper, or with the stains where a creeper had long ago crept; and all about the foot of the walls were the chopped-off trunks of ivy. It had a great front door, split down the middle; but rain had made the wood swell, they only ever opened up one half. Maud had to press her oline flat, and walk quite sideways, in order to leave the house at all.

    It was odd to see her stepping out of that gloomy place, like a pearl ing out of an oyster.

    It was odder to watch her going ba, ahe oyster shell open, then shut at her back.

    But there was not much to stay for, out in the park. There was that avenue of trees, that led up to the house. There was the bare bit of gravel that the house was set in. There lace they called a herb-garden, that grew mostly les; and an rown wood with blocked-off paths. At the edge of the wood was a little stone win-dowless building Maud said was an ice-house. Let us just cross to the door and look inside, she would say, and shed stand and gaze at the cloudy blocks of itil she shivered. At the back of the icehouse there started a muddy lahat led you to a shut-up old red chapel surrounded by yews. This was the queerest, quietest place I ever saw. I never heard a bird sing there. I didnt like to go to it, but Maud took that way often. For at the chapel there were graves, of all the Lillys that had e before her; and one of these lain stoomb, that was the grave of her mother.

    She could sit and look at that for an hour at a time, hardly blinking. Her scissors she used, not fathering flowers, but only for keeping down the grass that grew about it; and where her mothers name icked out iers of lead she would rub with her wet handkerchief to take off stains.

    She would rub until her hand shook and her breath came quick. She would never let me help her. That first day, when I tried, she said,

    It is a daughters duty, to tend to the grave of her mother. Walk off a while, and dont watch me.

    So I left her to it, and wandered among the tombs. The ground was hard as iron and my boots made it ring. I walked and thought of my own mother. She didnt have a grave, they dont give graves to murderesses. They put their bodies in quicklime.

    Did you ever pour salt on the back of a slug? John Vroom used to do it, and then laugh to see the slug fizz. He said to me once,

    Your mother fizzed like that. She fizzed, and ten mehat smelt it!

    He never said it again. I took up a pair of kit shears and put them to his neck. I said, Bad blood carries. Bad blood es out. And the look on his face was something!

    I wondered how Maud would look, if she knew what bad blood flowed in me.

    But she hought to ask. She only sat, gazing hard at her mothers name, while I wandered and stamped my feet. Then at last she sighed and looked about her, passed her hand across her eyes, and drew up her hood.

    This is a melancholy place, she said. Lets walk a little further.

    She led me away from the circle of yews, back down the laween the hedges, then away from the wood and the ice-house, to the edge of the park. Here, if you folloath that ran alongside a wall, you reached a gate. She had a key for it. It took you to the bank of a river. You could not see the river from the house. There was an a landing-place there, half rotted away, and a little upturned punt that made a kind of seat. The river was narrow, its water very quiet and muddy and filled with darting fish. All along the bank there grew rushes. They grew thid high. Maud walked slowly beside them, gazing nervously into the darkhey made where they met the water. I supposed she was frightened of shen she plucked up a reed and broke it, and sat with the tip of it pressed against her plump mouth.

    I sat beside her. The day was windless, but cold, and so quiet it hurt the ears. The air smelled thin.

    Pretty stretch of water, I said, for politeness sake.

    A barge went by. The men saw us and touched their hats. Iwaved.

    Bound  for London, said Maud, looking after them.

    London?

    She nodded. I didnt then know—for, who would have guessed it?—-that that trifling bit of water was the Thames. I thought she meant the boat would join a bigger river further on. Still, the idea that it would reach the city—maybe sail under Londe— made me sigh. I turo watch it follow a bend ier; then it passed from sight. The sound of its engine faded, the smoke from its ey joihe grey of the sky and was lost. The air was thin again. Maud still sat with the tip of the broken reed against her lip, her gaze very vague. I took up stones and began to throw them into the water. She watched me do it, winking at every splash. Then she led me back up to the house.

    We went back to her room. She got out a bit of sewing—a colourless, shapeless thing, I dont know if it was meant to be a tablecloth, or what. I never saw her w on anything else. She sewed in her gloves, very badly—making crooked stitches and then ripping half of them out. It made me nervous. We sat together before the spluttering fire, and talked in a weak kind of way—I fet what of—and then it grew dark, and a maid brought lights; and then the wind picked up and the windows began to rattle worse than ever. I said to myself, Dear God, let Gentleman e soon! I think a week of this will kill me; and I yawned. Maud caught my eye. Then she also yawhat made me yawn harder. At last she put her work aside and tucked up her feet and laid her head upon the arm of the sofa, and seemed to sleep.

    Thats all there was to do there, until the clock struck seven. When she heard that she gave a bigger yawn than ever, put her fio her eyes, and rose. Seven oclock was when she must ge her dress again—and ge her gloves, for ones of silk—to have supper with her uncle.

    She was two hours with him. I saw nothing of that, of course, but took my dinner i, with the servants. They told me

    that, when he had eaten, Mr Lilly liked his o sit ao him in the drawing-room. That was his idea of fun, I suppose, for they said he hardly ever had guests, and if he did then they were always other bookish gentlemen, from Oxford and London; and it was his pleasure, then, to have Maud read books to them all. Does she do nothing, pirl, but read? I asked. Her uncle wo her, said a parlourmaid. Thats how much he prizes her. Wont hardly let her out—fears shell break in two. Its him, you know, that keeps her all the time in gloves.

    Thats enough! said Mrs Stiles. What would Miss Maud say? Then the parlourmaid fell silent. I sat and thought about Mr Lilly, with his red cap and his gold repeater, his green eye-glasses, his black finger and tongue; and then about Maud, frowning over her eggs, rubbing hard at her mrave. It seemed a queer kind of prizing, that would make a girl like her, like that.

    I thought I knew all about her. Of course, I knew nothing. I had my dinner, listening to the servants talk, not saying much; and then Mrs Stiles asked me, Should I like to e and take my pudding with her and Mr Way, in her own pantry? I supposed I ought to. I sat gazing at the picture made all of hair. Mr Way read us pieces from the Maidenhead paper, and at every story—that were all about bulls breaking fences, or parsons making iing sermons in church—Mrs Stiles shook her head, saying, Well, did you ever hear the like? and Mr Way would chuckle and say, Youll see, Miss Smith, that we are quite a match for London, news-wise!

    Above his voice came the faint sound of laughter and scraping chairs, that was Cook and the scullery-maids and William Inker and the knife-boy, enjoying themselves i.

    Then the great house clock struck, and immediately after it the servants bell sounded; and that meant that Mr Lilly was ready to be seen by Mr Way into his bed, and that Maud was ready to be put by me into hers.

    I almost lost my way again, on my way back up; but even so, when she saw me she said,

    Is that you, Susan? You are quicker than Agnes. She smiled. I think you are handsomer, too. I dont think a girl  be hand-

    some—__do you?—with red hair. But nor with fair hair, either. I

    should like to be dark, Susan!

    She had had wih her supper, and I had had beer. I should

    ay we were both, in our own ways, rather tipsy. She had me stand

    beside her at the great silvery glass above her fireplace, and drew my

    head to hers, to pare the colours of our hair. Yours is the

    darker, she said.

    Then she moved away from the fire, for me to put her inthtgown.

    It was not much like undressing the chair in our old kit, after all. She stood shivering, saying, Quick! I shall freeze! Oh, heavens!—for her bedroom was as draughty as everywhere else there, and my fingers were cold and made her jump. They grew warm, though, after a miripping a lady is heavy work. Her corset was long, with a busk of steel; her waist, as I think I have said, was narrow: the kind of waist the doctors speak against, that gives a girl an illness. Her oline was made of watchspring. Her hair, is , was fixed with half a pound of pins, and a b of silver. Her petticoats and shimmy were calico. Underh it all, however, she was soft and smooth as butter. Too soft, I thought her. I imagined her bruising. She was like a lobster without its shell. She stood iogs while I fetched her nightgown, her arms above her head, her eyes shut tight; and for a sed I turned, and looked at her. My gaze was nothing to her. I saw her bosom, her bottom, her feather and everything and— apart from the feather, which was brown as a ducks—she ale as a statue on a pillar in a park. So pale she was, she seemed to shine.

    But again, it was a troubling kind of paleness, and I was glad to cover her up. I tidied her gown bato the press and jammed closed the door. She sat and waited, yawning, for me to e and brush her hair.

    Her hair was good, and very lo down. I brushed it, and held it, and thought what it might fetch.

    What are you thinking of? she said, her eyes on mine in the glass. Of your old mistress? Was her hair handsomer?

    Her hair was very poor, I said. And then, feeling sorry for Lady Alice: But she walked well. Do I walk well? You do, miss.

    She did. Her feet were small, her ankles slender like her waist. She smiled. As she had with our heads, she made me put my foot beside hers, to pare them.

    Yours is almost as , she said kindly.

    She got into her bed. She said she didnt care to lie in darkness. She had a rush-light in a tin shade kept beside her pillow, the kind old misers use, and she made me light it from the flame of my dle; and she would me tie the curtains of her bed, but had me pull them only a little way shut, so that she might see into the room beyond.

    And you will not, will you, quite close your door? she said. Agnes never used to. I didnt like it, before you came, having Margaret in a chair. I was afraid I would dream and have to call her. When Margaret touches, she pinches. Your hands, Susan, are hard as hers; a your touch is gentle.

    She reached and put her fingers quickly upon mine, as she said this; and I rather shuddered to feel the kid-skin on them—for she had ged out of her silk gloves, only to button another white pair ba. Theook her hands away and tucked her arms beh the bla. I pulled the bla perfectly smooth. I said, Shall that be all, miss?

    Yes, Susan, she answered. She moved her cheek upon her pillow. She didnt like the prig of her hair against her neck: she had put it back, and it snaked away into shadow, straight and dark and slender as a rope.

    When I took my dle off, the shadow spread across her like a wave. Her room was dimly lit by the lamp, but her bed was in darkness. I half-closed my door, and heard her lift her head. A little wider, she called softly, so I ope further. Then I stood and rubbed my face. I had been at Briar only a day; but it was the lo day of my life. My hands were sore from pulling laces. When I closed my eyes, I saw hooks. Undressing myself had no fun in it, now I had undressed her.

    At last I sat and blew out my dle; and heard her move. There wasnt a sound in the house: I heard her, very clearly, rise from her pillow and twist in her bed. I heard her read draw out her key, then put it to the little wooden box. At the click of the lock, I got up. I thought, Well, I  be silent, if you t. I am softer than you or your uncle know; and I made my way to the crack of the door and peeped through. She had leaned out of the curtained bed, and had the portrait of the handsome lady—her mother—in her hand. As I watched, she raised the portrait to her mouth, kissed it, and spoke soft, sad words to it. The it from her with a sigh. She kept the key in a book beside her bed. I hadnt thought to look in there. She locked the box back up, set it ly oable— touched it oouched it twid then moved back behind the curtain and was still.

    I grew too tired to watch her, then. I moved back, too. My room was dark as ink. I reached with my hands and found the bla and sheets, and pulled them down. I got beh them; and lay cold as a frog in my own narrow ladys maids bed.

    I ot say how long I slept for then. I could not say, when I woke up, what awful sound it was that had woken me. I did not know, for a minute or two, whether my eyes were open or closed—for the darkness was so deep, there was no differe was only when I gazed at the open door to Mauds room and saw the faint light there, that I knew I was awake and not dreaming. What I had heard, I thought, was some great crash or thud, and then perhaps a cry. Now, in the instant of my opening my eyes, there was a silence; but as I lifted my head a my heart beat hard, the cry came again. It was Maud, calling out in a high, frightened voice. She was calling on her old maid:

    Agnes! Oh! Oh! Agnes!

    I didnt know what I would see when I went in to her—perhaps, a busted window and a burglar, pulling at her head, cutting the hair off. But the window, though it still rattled, was quite unbroken; and there was no-ohere with her, she had e to the gap in her bed-curtains with the blas all bunched beh her  and her

    hair flung about, half c her face. Her face ale and strange. Her eyes, that I knew were only brown, seemed black Black, like Polly Perkinss, as the pips in a pear. She said again, Agnes! I said, Its Sue, miss.

    She said, Agnes, did you hear that sound? Is the door shut? The door? The door was closed. Is someohere? A man? she said. A man? A burglar?

    At the door? Dont go, Agnes! Im afraid hell harm you! She was afraid. She was shtened, she began thten me. I said, I dont think theres a man, miss. I said, Let me try and light a dle.

    But have you ever tried to light a dle from a rush-light in a tin shade? I could not get the wick to catch; and she kept on, weeping and calling me Agnes, until my hand shook so much I could not hold the dle steady.

    I said, Y.ou must be quiet, miss. Theres no man; and if there is, then I shall call for Mr Way to e and catch him.

    I took up the rush-light. Dont take the light! she cried at once. I beg you, dont!

    I said I would only take it to the door, to show her there was no-ohere; and while she wept and clutched at the bed-clothes I went with the light to the door to her parlour and—all in a fling, winking kind of way—I pulled it open.

    The room beyond was very dark. The few great bits of furniture sat humped about, like the baskets with the thieves in, in the play of AH Baba. I thought how dismal it would be if I had e all the way to Briar, from the Bh, to be murdered by burglars. And what if the burglar proved to be a man I knew—say, one of Mr Ibbss nephews? Queer things like that do happen.

    So I stood gazing fearfully at the dark room, thinking all this, half-ined to call out—in case there were burglars there—that they should hold their hands, that I was family; but of course, there was no-o was quiet as a church. I saw that, and the quickly to the parlour door, and looked into the passage; and that

    was

    was dark and quiet, too—there was only the tig of some clock, far-of.f and more rattling windows. But after all it was not quite Pleasant, standing in a night-dress, with a rush-light, in a great dark silent house that, though it didnt have thieves in, might cer-

    tainly have ghosts. I closed the door quick, a baauds oom and closed that door, and stepped to the side of her bed and put the light down.

    She said, Did you see him? Oh, Agnes, is he there?

    I was about to answer, but then I stopped. For I had looked towards the er of the room, where the black press was; and there was something strahere. There was something long and white and gleaming, that was moving against the wood . . . Well, I have said, havent I, that Ive a warm imagination? I was certain that the thing was Mauds dead mother, e back as a ghost to haunt me. My heart leapt so hard into my mouth, I seemed to taste it. I screamed, and Maud screamed, then clutched at me a harder. Dont look at me! she cried. And then: Dont leave me! Dont leave me!

    And then I saw what the white thing really was, and hopped from foot to foot and almost laughed.

    For it was only the cage of her oline, sprung out from where I had jammed it on the shelf with one of her shoes. The door of the press had swung open and hit the wall: that was the hat had woken us. The oline was hanging from a hook, and quivering. My footsteps had made the springs bounce.

    I saw it, as I say, and almost laughed; but when I looked again at Maud, her eyes were still so blad wild and her face so pale, and she clutched at me so hard, I thought it would be cruel to let her see me smile. I put my hands ay mouth, and the breath came out between my jumping fingers, and my teeth began to chatter. I was colder than ever.

    I said, Its nothing, miss. After all, its nothing. You was only dreaming.

    Dreaming, Agnes?

    She put her head against my bosom, and shook. I smoothed her hair back from her cheek, and held her until she grew calm.

    There, I said then, Shall you sleep again now? Let me put the bla about you, look.

    But when I made to lay her down, she gripped me harder. Dont leave me, Agnes! she said again.

    I said, Its Sue, miss. Agnes had the scarlatina, and is gone back to Cork. Remember? You must lie down now, or the cold will make you ill, too.

    She looked at me then, and her gaze, that was still so dark, seemed yet a little clearer.

    Dont leave me, Sue! she whispered. Im afraid, of my own dreaming!

    Her breath was sweet. Her hands and arms were warm. Her face was smooth as ivory or alabaster. In a few weeks time, I thought— if our plot worked—she would be lying in the bed of a madhouse. Who would there be to be kind to her, then?

    So I put her from me, but only for a moment; and I clambered over her and got beh the blas at her side. I put my arm about her, and at once she sank against me. It seemed the least that I could do. I pulled her closer. She was slender as anything. Not like Mrs Sucksby. Not like Mrs Sucksby, at all. She was more like a child. She still shivered a little, and when she blinked I felt the sweep of her lashes against my throat, like feathers. In time, however, the shivering stopped, and her lashes swept again and then were still. She grew heavy, and warm.

    Good girl, I said, too softly to wake her.

    m I woke a minute before she did. She opened her eyes, saw me, looked troubled, and tried to hide it.

    Did my dreams wake me in the night? she said, not meeting my gaze. Did I say foolish things? They say I speak nonsense, in my sleep, as irls snore. She blushed, and laughed. But how good you were, to e and keep me pany!

    I didnt tell her about the oli eight oclock she went off to her uncle, and at one I went to fetch her—taking care, this time, to mind the pointing finger on the floor. Then we walked in the park, to the graves and the river; she sewed, and dozed, and was

    rung to her supper; and I sat with Mrs Stiles until half-past nine, when it was time to go back up and put her to bed. It was all just the first day, ain. She said, Good-night, and laid her head upon her pillow; then I stood in my room and heard her little box unlocked, and peeped through the door to watch her take up the portrait, kiss it, then put it away.

    And then, I had not put out my dle two minutes, before her voice came calling softly: Sue—!

    She said she could not sleep. She said she was cold. She said she would like to keep me close tain, in case she woke up frightened.

    She said the same thing the  night; and the night after that. You dont mind? she asked me. She said Agnes never minded. Did you never, she said, sleep with Lady Alice, at Mayfair?

    What could I tell her? For all I knew, it might have been an ordinary thing, for a mistress and her maid to double up like girls.

    It was ordinary at first, with Maud and me. Her dreams never bothered her. We slept, quite like sisters. Quite like sisters, indeed. I always wanted a sister.

    Theleman came.

 Chapter Four

    He came, I suppose, about two weeks afiter I got there. It was only two weeks ahe hours at Briar were such slow ones, and the days—being all quite the same—were so even and quiet and long, it might have been twice that time.

    It was long enough, anyway, for me to find out all the peculiar habits of the house; long enough for me to get used to the other servants, and for them to get used to me. For a while, I didnt know why it was they did not care for me. I would go down to the kit, saying, How do you do? to whoever I met there: How do you do, Margaret? All right, Charles? (That was the knife-boy.) How are you, Mrs Cakebread? (That was the cook: that really was her  wasnt a joke and no-one laughed at it.) And Charles might look at me as if he was too afraid to speak; and Mrs Cakebread would answer, in a nasty kind of way, Oh, Im sure Im very well, thank you.

    I supposed they were peeved to have me about, reminding them

    of all the flash London things they would never, in that quiet and out-of-the-lace, get a look at. Then one day Mrs Stiles took me aside. She said, I hope you dont mind, Miss Smith, if I have a little word? I t say how the house was run in your last place— She started everything she said to me with a line like that.—I t say how you did things in London, but here at Briar we like to keep very mindful of the footings of the house ...&quot;

    It turned out that Mrs Cakebread had fancied herself insulted, by my saying good-m to the kit-maid and the knife-boy before I said it to her; and Charles thought I meant to tease him, by wishing him good-m at all. It was all the most trifling sort of nonsense, and enough to make a cat laugh; but it was life ah to them—I suppose, it would be life ah to you, if all you had to look forward to for the  forty years was carrying trays and baking pastry. Anyway, I saw that, if I was to get anywhere with them, I must watch my steps. I gave Charles a bit of chocolate, that I had carried down with me from the Bh and never eaten; I gave Margaret a piece of sted soap; and to Mrs Cakebread I gave a pair of those black stogs that Gentleman had had Phil get for me from the crooked warehouse.

    I said I hoped there were no hard feelings. If I met Charles oairs in the m, then, I looked the other way. They were all muicer to me after that.

    Thats like a servant. A servant says, All for my master, and means, All for myself. Its the two-faess of it that I t bear. At Briar, they were all on the dodge in one way or another, but all over sneaking little matters that would have put a real thief to the blush—such as, holding off the fat from Mr Lillys gravy to sell on the quiet to the butchers boy; which is what Mrs Cakebread did. Or, pulling the pearl buttons from Mauds chemises, and keeping them, and saying they were lost; which is what Margaret did. I had them all worked out, after three days watg. I might have been Mrs Sucksbys own daughter after all. Mr Way, now: he had a mark on the side of his nose—in the Bh we should have called it a gin-bud. And how do you thi that, in a place like his? He had the key to Mr Lillys cellar, on a . You never saw such a

    shine as that key had on it! And then, when we had finished our meals in Mrs Stiless pantry, he would make a great show of loading up the tray—and Id see him, whehought no-one was looking, tipping the beer from the bottom of all the glasses into one great cup, and lushing it away.

    I saw it—but, of course, I kept it all to myself. I wasnt there to make trouble. It was nothing to me, if he drank himself to death. And I passed most of my time, anyway, with Maud. I got used to her, too. She had her finig ways, all right; but they were slight enough, it didnt hurt me to indulge them. And I was good at w hard, on little things: I began to take a kind of pleasure in the keeping of her gowns, the tidying of her pins and bs and boxes. I was used to dressing infants. I grew used to dressing her.

    Lift your arms, miss, Id say. Lift your foot. Step here. Now, here.

    Thank you, Sue, she would always murmur. Sometimes she would close her eyes. How well you know me, she might say. I think you know the turning of all my limbs.

    I did, in time. I knew all that she liked and hated. I knew what food she would eat, and what shed leave—and when Cook, for instance, kept sending up eggs, I went and told her to send soup instead.

    Clear soup, I said. Clear as you  make it. All right? She made a face. Mrs Stiles, she said, wont like it. Mrs Stiles dont have to eat it, I answered. And Mrs Stiles aint Miss Mauds maid. I am.

    So then she did send soup. Maud ate it all up. Why are you smiling? she said, in her anxious way, when she had finished. I said I wasnt. She put down her spoon. Then she frowned, like before, over her gloves. They had got splashed.

    Its only water, I said, seeing her face. It wont hurt you. She bit her lip. She sat another mih her hands in her lap, stealing gla her fingers, growing more and more restless. Finally she said:

    I think the water has a little fat in it...&quot;

    Then, it was easier to go into her room a her a fresh pair of

    aloves myself, than to sit and watch her fret. Let me do it, I said, undoing the button at her wrist; and though at first she would me touch her bare hands, in time—since I said I would be gentle— she began to let me. When her fingernails grew long I cut them, with a pair of silver scissors she had, that were shaped like a flying bird. Her nails were soft and perfectly , and grew quickly, like a childs nails. When I cut, she flihe skin of her hands was smooth—but, like the rest of her, too smooth to be right, I never saw it without thinking of the things—rough things, sharp things— that would mark or hurt it. I was glad whe her gloves ba. The slivers of nail that I had cut away I would gather up out of my lap and throw on the fire. She would stand and watch them turn black. She did the same with the hairs I drew from her brushes and bs—frowning while they wriggled on the coals, like worms, then flared and turo ash. Sometimes Id stand and look with

    her.

    For there werent the things to notice, at Briar, that there were at home. You watched, instead, things like that: the rising of smoke, the passing of clouds in the sky. Each day we walked to the river, to see how it had lifted or dropped. Iumn, it floods, Maud said, and all the rushes are drowned. I dont care for that. And some nights a white mist es creeping from the water, almost to the walls of my uncles house . . . She shivered. She always said, my uncles, she never said my. The ground was crisp, and when it gave beh our boots she said: How brittle the grass is! I think the river will freeze. I think it is freezing already. Do you see how it struggles? It wants to flow, but the cold will still it. Do you see, Sue? Here, among the rushes?

    She gazed, and frowned. I watched the movement of her face. And I said—as I had said about the soup: Its only water, miss.

    Only water?

    Brown water.

    She blinked.

    You are cold, I said then. e back, to the house. Weve been out too long. I put her arm about mine. I did it, not thinking; and her arm stayed stiff. But then, the  day—or perhaps, the day

    after that—she took my arm again, and was not so stiff; and after that, I suppose we joined arms naturally ... I dont know. It was only later that I wondered about it and tried to look back. But by then I could only see that there was oime when we had walked apart; and then a time when we walked together.

    She was just a girl, after all; for all that they called her a lady. She was just a girl that had never known fun. One day I was tidying one of her drawers and found a deck of cards in it. She said she thought they must have been her mothers. She khe suits, but that was all—she called the jacks, cavaliers!—so I taught her one or two soft Bh games—All-fours, and Put. We played for matches and spills, at first; then we found, in another drawer, a box of little ters, made of mother-of-pearl and shaped like fish and diamonds and crest moons; and after that, we played for them. The mother-of-pearl was very sweet and cool on the hand.—My hand, I mean; for Maud of course still wore her gloves. And whe down a card she put it dowly, making the edges and ers match with the ones below. After a while I began to do that, too.

    While we played, we talked. She liked to hear me talk of London. Is it truly se? shed say. And there are theatres? And what they call, fashion-houses?

    Aing-houses. And every kind of shop. And parks, miss.

    Parks, like my uncles?

    A little like, Id say. But filled with people, of course.—Are you low, miss, h?

    I am high. She set down a card.—Quite filled, would you say?

    I am higher. There. Three fish, to your two.

    How well you play!—Quite filled, you say, with people?

    Of course. But dark. Will you cut?

    Dark? Are you sure? I thought London was said to be bright. With great lamps fired—I believe—with gas?

    Great lamps, like diamonds! I said. Iheatres and halls. You may dahere, miss, right through the night—

    Dance, Sue?

    Dance, miss. Her face had ged. I put the cards down. You like to dance, of course?

    I— She coloured, and lowered her gaze. I was aught it. Do you think, she said, looking up, I might be a lady, in London— that is, she added quickly, if I were ever to go there.—Do you think I might be a lady in London, a not dance?

    She passed her hand across her lip, rather nervously. I said, You might, I suppose. Shouldnt you like to learn, though? You could find a dang-master.

    Could I? She looked doubtful, then shook her head. I am not sure . . .

    I guessed what she was thinking. She was thinking of Gentleman, and what he might say when he found out she couldnt dance. She was thinking of all the girls he might be meeting in London, who could.

    I watched her fret for a minute or two. Then, Look here, I said, getting up. It is easy, look—

    And I showed her a couple of steps, to a couple of dahen I made her rise and try them with me. She stood in my arms like wood, and gazed, in a frightened sort of way, at her feet. Her slippers caught ourkey carpet. So then I put the carpet back; and then she moved more easily. I showed her a jig, and then a polka. I said, There. Now were flying, aint we? She gripped my gown until I thought it should tear. This way, I said. Now, this. I am the gentleman, remember. Of course, it will go much better, with a real gent—

    Theumbled again, and we fleart and fell into separate chairs. She put her hands to her side. Her breath came in catches. Her colour was higher than ever. Her cheek was damp. Her skirt stuck out like a little Dutch girls on a plate.

    She caught my eye, and smiled; though she still looked frightened.

    I shall dance, she said, in London. Shant I, Sue?

    You shall, I said. And at that moment, I believed it. I made her rise and dance again. It was only afterwards, when we had stopped and she had grown cool, and stood before the fire to warm up her cold hands—it was only then that I remembered that, of course, she never would.

    For, though I knew her fate—though I k so well, I was helping to make it!—perhaps I k rather in the way you might know the fate of a person in a story or a play. Her world was so queer, so quiet and shut-up, it made the proper world—the ordinary, double-dealing world, where I had sat over a pigs head supper and a glass of flip while Mrs Sucksby and John Vroom laughed to think what I would do with my share of Gentlemans stolen fortu made that world seem harder than ever, but so far off, the hardness meant nothing. At first I would say to myself, Wheleman es Ill do this; or, Once he gets her in the madhouse, Ill do that. But Id say it, then look at her; and she was so simple and so good, the thought would vanish, I would end up bing her hair or straightening the sash on her gown. It wasnt that I was sorry—or not muot then. It was just I suppose that we were put together fo<u></u>r so many hours at a time; and it was o be kind to her and not think too hard about what lay before her, than to dwell on it and feel cruel.

    Of course, it was different for her. She was looking forwards. She liked to talk; but more often she liked to be silent, and think. I would see her face ge, then. I would lie at her side at night, ahe turning, turning of her thoughts—feel her grow warm, perhaps blush in the dark; and then I knew she was thinking of Gentleman, w out how soon hed e, w if he was thinking of her.—I could have told her, he was. But she never spoke of him, she never said his name. She only asked, once or twice, after my old aunty, that was supposed to be his nurse; and I wished she wouldnt, for when I spoke of her I thought of Mrs Sucksby; and that made me home-sick.

    And then there came the m when we learned he was ing back. It was an ordinary m, except that Maud had woken and rubbed her face, and winced.—Perhaps that was what they call, a premonition. I only thought that later, though. At the time, I saw her chafing her cheek and said, Whats the matter?

    She moved her tongue. I have a tooth, I think, she said, with a point that cuts me.

    Let me see, I said.

    I took her to the window and she stood with her fa my hands

    a me feel about her gum. I found the poiooth almost at

    once.

    Well, that is sharper— 1 began.

    Than a serpents tooth, Sue? she said.

    Than a needle, I was going to say, miss, I answered. I went to her sewing-box and brought out a thimble. A silver thimble, to match the flying scissors.

    Maud stroked her jaw. Do you know anyone who was bitten by a snake, Sue? she asked me.

    What could you say? Her mind ran to things like that. Perhaps it was the try living. I said I didnt. She looked at me, then opened her mouth again and I put the thimble on my finger and rubbed at the poiooth until the point was taken off. I had seen Mrs Sucksby do it many times, with infants.—Of course, infants rather wriggle about. Maud stood very still, her pink lips parted, her face put back, her eyes at first closed then open and gazing at me, her cheek with a flush upon it. Her throat lifted and sank, as she swallowed. My hand grew wet, from the damp of her breaths. I rubbed, the with my thumb. She swallowed again. Her eyelids fluttered, and she caught my eye.

    And, as she did, there came a knock upon the door; ah jumped. I stepped away. It was one of the parlourmaids. She had a letter on a tray. For Miss Maud, she said, with a curtsey. I looked at the hand, and k ohat it must be Gentlemans. My heart gave a dip. So did Mauds, I think.

    Bring it here, will you? she said. And then: Will you pass me my shawl, also? The flush had gone from her face, though her cheek was still red where I had pressed it. When I put the shawl across her shoulders, I felt her trembling.

    I watched her then, seeming not to, as I moved about her rooms, taking up books and cushions, putting away the thimble and closing her box. I saw her turter and fumble with it—of course, she could not tear the paper, with her gloves on. So then she sneaked a look at me, and then she lowered her hands and—still trembling,

    but making a show of carelessness, that was meant to say it was nothing to her, yet showed that it was everything—she unbuttoned one glove and put her fio the seal, thehe letter from the envelope and held it in her naked hand and read it.

    The out her breath in a single great sigh. I picked up a cushion and hit the dust from it.

    Good news, miss, is it? I said; sihought I ought to.

    She hesitated. Then: Very good, she answered, —for my uncle, I mean. It is from Mr Rivers, in London; and what do you think? She smiled. He is ing back to Briar, tomorrow!

    The smile stayed on her lips all day, like paint; and iernoon, when she came from her uncle, she wouldnt sit sewing, o for a walk, would not even play at cards, but paced about the room, and sometimes stood before the glass, smoothing her brows, toug her plump mouth—hardly speaking to me, hardly seei all.

    I got the cards out anyway, and played by myself. I thought of Gentleman, laying out the kings and queens in the Lant Street kit while he told us all his plot. Then I thought of Dainty. Her mother—that had ended up drowned—had been able to tell fortunes from a pack of cards. I had seen her do it, many times.

    I looked at Maud, standing dreaming at the mirror. I said,

    Should you like to know your future, miss? Did you know that you  read it, from how the cards fall?

    That made her turn from looking at her own face, to look at mine. She said after a moment,

    I thought it was only gipsy women could do that.

    Well, but dont tell Margaret or Mrs Stiles, I said. My grandmother, you know, sy-princess.

    And after all, my granny might have been a gipsy-princess, for all I knew of it. I put the cards together again, ahem to her. She hesitated, then came and sat beside me, spreading her great skirt flat, saying, What must I do?

    I said she must sit with her eyes closed for a minute, and think of the subjects that were  her heart; which she did. Then I said she must take the cards and hold them, the out the first seven

    of them, face down—which is what I thought I remembered Daintys mother doing; or it might have been nine cards. Anyway, Maud set down seven.

    I looked her in the eye and said, Now, do you really want to know your fortune?

    She said, Sue, you are frightening me!

    I said again, Do you really want to know it? What the cards teach you, you must obey. It is very bad luck to ask the cards to show you oh, then choose another. Do you promise to be bound by the fortune you find here?

    I do, she answered quietly.

    Good, I said. Here is your life, laid all before us. Let us see the first part of it. These cards show your Past.

    I turned over the first two cards. They were the Queen of Hearts, followed by the Three of Spades. I remember them because of course, while she had been sitting with her eyes tight shut, I had sprung the pack; as anyone would have I think, being in my place then.

    I studied them and said, Hmm. These are sad cards. Here is a kind and handsome lady, look; and here a parting, and the beginning of strife.

    She stared, then put her hand to her throat. Go on, she said. Her face ale now.

    Let us look, I said, at the hree cards. They show your Present.

    I turhem over with a flourish.

    The King of Diamonds, I said. A stern old gentleman. The Five of Clubs: a parched mouth. The Cavalier of Spades—

    I took my time. She leaowards me.

    Whats he? she said. The Cavalier?

    I said he was a young man on horseback, with good in his heart; and she looked at me in su astonished believing sort of way, I was almost sorry. She said, in a low voiow I am afraid! Dont turhe  cards.

    I said, Miss, I must. Or all your luck will leave you. Look here. These show your Future.

    I turhe first. The Six of Spades.

    A journey! I said. Perhaps, a trip with Mr Lilly? Or perhaps, a journey of the heart...&quot;

    She didnt answer, only sat gazing at the cards I had turned up. Then: Show the last one, she said in a whisper. I showed it. She saw it first.

    Queen of Diamonds, she said, with a sudden frown. Whos she?

    I did not know. I had meant to turn up the Two of Hearts, for lovers; but after all, must have muddled the deck.

    The Queen of Diamonds, I said at last. Great wealth, I think.

    Great wealth? She leaned away from me and looked about her, at the faded carpet and the black oak walls. I took the cards and shuffled them. She brushed at her skirt and rose. I dont believe, she said, that yrandmother really sy. You are too fair in the face. I dont believe it. And I dont like your fortuelling. Its a game for servants.

    She stepped away from me, and stood again before the glass; and though I thought she would turn and say something kinder, she didnt. But as she went, she moved a chair: and then I saw the Two of Hearts. It had fallen on the floor—she had had her slipper on it, and her heel had creased the pips.

    The crease was a deep one. I always khat card, after that, in the games we played, in the weeks that followed.

    That afternoon, however, she made me put the cards away, saying the sight of them made her giddy; and that night she was fretful. She got into bed, but had me pour her out a little cup of water; and as I stood undressing I saw her take up a bottle and slip three drops from it into the cup. It was sleeping-draught. That was the first time I saw her take it. It made her yawn. When I woke  day, though, she was already awake, lying with a strand of her hair pulled to her mouth, and gazing at the figures in the opy over the bed.

    Brush my hair hard, she said to me, as she stood for me to dress her. Brush it hard and make it shine. Oh, how horrid and white my cheek is! Pinch it, Sue. She put my fio her face, and pressed

    them Pinch my cheek, dont mind if you bruise it. Id rather a blue cheek than a horrid white one!

    Her eyes were dark, perhaps from the sleeping-drops. Her brow was creased. It troubled me to hear her talk of bruises. I said,

    Stand still, or I shant be able to dress you at all.—Thats better. Now, which gown will you have?

    The grey?

    The greys too soft on the eye. Lets say, the blue . . .

    The blue brought out the fairness of her hair. She stood before the glass and watched as I butto tight. Her face grew smoother, the higher I went. Then she looked at me. She looked at my brown stuff dress. She said,

    Your dress is rather plain, Sue—isnt it? I think you ought to ge it.

    I said, ge it? This is all I have.

    All you have? Good gracious. I am weary of it already. What were you used to wearing for Lady Alice, who was so nice? Did she never pass any of her own dresses on to you?

    I felt—and I think I was right in feeling it—that Gentleman had let me down a bit here, sending me off to Briar with just the one good gown. I said,

    Well, the fact is, miss, Lady Alice was kind as an angel; but she was also rather near. She kept my frocks back, to take to India for her girl there.

    Maud blinked her dark eyes and looked sorry. She said,

    Is that how ladies treat their maids, in London?

    Only the near ones, miss, I answered.

    Then she said, Well, I have nothing to be near for, here. You must and shall have anown, to spend your ms in. And perhaps another besides that, for you to ge into when— Well, say we ever had a visitor?

    She hid her face behind the door of her press. She said,

    Now, I believe we are of a similar size. Here are two or three dresses, look, that I never wear and shant miss. You like your skirts long, I see. My uncle does not care to see me in a long skirt, he believes long skirts uhy. But he shant mind, of course, about

    you. You need only let down this hem a little here. You  do that, of course?

    Well, I was certainly used to taking stitches out; and I could sew a straight seam when I o. I said, Thank you, miss. She held a dress before me. It was a queer thing e velvet, with fringes and a wide skirt. It looked like it had been blown together by a strong wind in a ladies tailors. She studied me, and then said,

    Oh, try it, Susan, do! Look, I shall help you. She came close, and began to undress me. See, I  do it, quite as well as you. Now I am your maid, and you are the mistress!

    She laughed, a little nervously, all the time she worked. Why, look here in the glass, she said at last. We might be sisters!

    She had tugged my old brown dress off me and put the queer e one over my head, and she made me stand before the glass while she saw to the hooks. Breathe in, she said. Breathe harder! The gown grips tight, but will give you the figure of a lady.

    Of course, her own waist was narrow, and she was taller by an inch. My hair was the darker. We did not look like sisters, we just both looked like frights. My dress showed all my ankle. If a boy from the Bh had seehen, I should have fallen down and died.

    But there were nh boys to see me; and nh girls, either. And it was a very good velvet. I stood, plug at the fringes on the skirt, while Maud ran to her jewel box for a brooch, that she fasteo my bosom, tilting her head to see how it looked. Then there came a kno the parlour door.

    Theres Margaret, she said, her face quite pink. She called, e here to the dressing-room, Margaret!

    Margaret came and made a curtsey, looking straight at me. She said,

    I have just e for your tray, mi— Oh! Miss Smith! Is it you, there? I should never have known you from the mistress, Im sure!

    She blushed, and Maud—who was standing in the shadow of the bed-curtain—looked girlish, putting her hand before her mouth. She shivered with laugh<q>９９ｌiｂ?</q>ter, and her dark eyes shone.

    Suppose, she said, when Margaret had gone, suppose Mr Rivers were to do what Margaret did, and mistake you for me? What would we do, then?

    Again she laughed and shivered. I gazed at the glass, and smiled.

    For it was something, wasnt it, to be taken for a lady?

    Its what my mother would have wanted.

    And anyway, I was to get the pick of all her dresses and her jewels, in the end. I was only starting early. I kept the e gown and, while she went to her uncle, sat turning the hem down aing out the bodice. I wasnt about to do myself an injury, for the sake of a sixteen-inch waist.

    Now, do we look handsome? said Maud, when I fetched her back. She stood and looked me over, then brushed at her own skirts. But here is dust, she cried, from my uncles shelves! Oh! The books, the terrible books!

    She was almost weeping, and wringing her hands.

    I took the dust away, and wished I could tell her she was fretting for nothing. She might be dressed in a sack. She might have a face like a coal-heavers. So long as there was fifteen thousand in the bank marked Miss Maud Lilly, theleman would want her.

    It was almost awful to see her, knowing what I knew, pretending I knew nothing; and with another kind of girl, it might have been ical. I would say, Are you poorly, miss? Shall I fetch you something? Shall I bring you the little glass, to look at your fa?—and she would answer, Poorly? I am only rather cold, and walking to keep my blood warm. And, A glass, Sue? Why should I need a glass?

    I thought you were looking at your own face, miss, more than was usual.

    My own face! And why should I be ied in doing that?

    I t say, miss, Im sure.

    I knew his train was due at Marlow at four oclock, and that William Inker had beeo meet it, as he had bee for me. At three, Maud said she would sit at the window and work at her sewing there, where the light was good. Of course, it was nearly dark then; but I said nothing. There was a little padded seat beside the rattling panes and mouldy sand-bags, it was the coldest pla the room; but she kept there for an hour and a half, with a shawl about her, shivering, squinting at her stitches, and sneaking sly little gla the road to the house.

    I thought, if that wasnt love, then I was a Dut; and if it was love, then lovers were pigeons and geese, and I was glad I was not one of them.

    At last she put her fio her heart and gave a stifled sort of cry. She had seen the light ing, on William Irap. That made her get up and e away from the window, and stand at the fire and press her hands together. Then came the sound of the horse on the gravel. I said, Will that be Mr Rivers, miss? and she answered, Mr Rivers? Is the day so late as that? Well, I suppose it is. How pleased my uncle will be!

    Her uncle saw him first. She said, Perhaps he will send for me, to bid Mr Rivers wele.—How does my skirt sit now? Had I not rather wear the grey?

    But Mr Lilly did not send for her. We heard voices and closing doors in the rooms below, but it was another hain before a parlourmaid came, to pass on the message that Mr Rivers was arrived.

    And is Mr Rivers made fortable, in his old room? said Maud.

    Yes, miss.

    And Mr Rivers will be rather tired, I suppose, after his journey?

    Mr Rivers sent to say that he was tolerable tired, and looked forward to seeing Miss Lilly with her u supper. He would not think of disturbing Miss Lilly before then.

    I see, she said when she heard that. The her lip. Please to tell Mr Rivers that she would not think it any sort of disturbao be visited by him, in her parlour, before the supper-hour came . . .

    She went on like this for a minute and a half, falling over her words, and blushing; and finally the parlourmaid got the message a off. She was gone a quarter of an hour. When she came back, she had Gentleman with her.

    He stepped into the room, and did not look at me at first. His eyes were all for Maud. He said,

    Miss Lilly, you are kind to receive me here, all travel-stained and tumbled as I am. That is like you!

    His voice was gentle. As for the stains—well, there wasnt a mark upon him, I guessed he had gone quickly to his room and ged his coat. His hair was sleek and his whiskers tidy; he wore one modest little ring on his smallest finger, but apart from that his hands were bare and very .

    He looked what he was meant to be—a handsome, nice-minded gentleman. Wheuro me at last, I found myself making him a curtsey and was almost shy.

    And here is Susan Smith! he said, looking me over in my velvet, his lip twitg towards a smile. But I should have supposed her a lady, I am sure! He stepped towards me and took my hand, and Maud also came to me. He said, I hope you are liking your place at Briar, Sue. I hope you are proving a good girl for your new mistress.

    I said, I hope I am too, sir.

    She is a very good girl, said Maud. She is a very good girl, indeed.

    She said it in a nervous, grateful kind of way—like you would say it to a stranger, feeling pushed for versation, about y.

    Gentleman pressed my hand ohe fall. He said, Of course, she could not help but be good—I should say, no girl could help but be good, Miss Lilly—with you as her example.

    Her colour had gone down. Now it rose again. You are too kind, she said.

    He shook his head and bit at his lip. leman could but be, he murmured, with you to be kind to,

    Now his cheeks were pink as hers. I should say he must have had a way of holding his breath to make the blood e. He kept his eyes upon her, and at last she gazed at him and smiled; and then she laughed.

    And I thought then, for the first time, that he had been right. She was handsome, she was very fair and slight—I k, seeiand beside him with her eyes on his.

    Pigeons and geese. The great clock sounded, and they started and looked away. Gentleman said he had kept her too long. I shall see you at supper, I hope, with your uncle?

    With my uncle, yes, she said quietly.

    He made her a bow, ao the door; then, when he was almost out of it he seemed to remember me, ahrough a kind of pantomime, of patting at his pockets, looking for s. He came up with a shilling, and beed me close to take it.

    Here you are, Sue, he said. He lifted my hand and pressed the shilling in it. It was a bad one. All well? he added softly, so that Maud should not overhear.

    I said, Oh, thank you, sir! And I made another curtsey, and wiwo curious things to do together, as it happened, and I would not reend you try it: for I fear the wink unbalahe curtsey; and Im certain the curtsey threw off the wink.

    I dont thileman noticed, however. He only smiled in a satisfied way, bowed again, a us. Maud looked o me, the silently to her own room and closed the door—I dont know what she did in there. I sat until she called me, a half-hour later, to help her ge intown for dinner.

    I sat and tossed the shilling. Well, I thought, bad s will gleam as well as good.

    But I thought it in a distented sort of way; and didnt know why.

    That night she stayed an hour or two after supper, reading to her uncle and to Gentleman in the drawing-room. I had not seen the drawing-room then. I only knew what she did when I wasnt with her, through Mr Way or Mrs Stiles happening to remark on it as we took our meals. I still passed my evenings i and in Mrs Stiless pantry; and pretty dull evenings they generally were. This night, however, was different. I went down to find Margaret with two forks in a great piece of roasting ham, and Mrs Cakebread spooning honey on it. Honeyed ham, said Margaret, plumping up her lips, was Mr Riverss favourite dish. Mr Rivers, said Mrs Cakebread, leasure to cook for.

    She had ged her old wool stogs for the black silk pair I had givehe parlourmaids had ged their caps, for ones with extra ruffles. Charles, the knife-boy, had bed his hair flat, and made the parting straight as a blade: he sat whistling, on a stool beside the fire, rubbing polish into one of Gentlemans boots.

    He was the same age as John Vroom; but was fair, where John was swarthy. He said, What do you say to this, Mrs Stiles? Mr Rivers says that, in London, you may see elephants. He says they keep elephants in pens in the parks of London, as we keep sheep; and a boy  pay a man sixpence, and ride on an elephants back.

    Well, bless my soul! said Mrs Stiles.

    She had fastened a brooch at the neck of her gown. It w<var></var>as a m brooch, with more black hair in it.

    Elephants! I thought. I could see that Gentleman had e among them, like a coto a coop of roosting hens, ahem all fluttering. They said he was handsome. They said he was better-bred than many dukes, and khe proper treating of a servant. They said what a fihing it was for Miss Maud that a clever young person like him should be about the house again. If I had stood up and told them the truth—that they were a bunch of flats; that Mr Rivers was a fiend in human form, who meant to marry Maud and steal her cash, then lock her up and more or less hope she died—if I had stood and told them that, they should never have believed it. They should have said that I was mad.

    They will always believe a gentleman, over someone like me.

    And of course, I wasnt about to tell them any such thing. I kept my thoughts to myself; and later, over pudding in her pantry, Mrs Stiles sat, fingering her brooch, and was also rather quiet. Mr Way took his neer away to the privy. He had had to serve up two fine wines with Mr Lillys dinner; and was the only one, out of all of us, not glad that Gentleman had e.

    At least, I supposed I was glad. You are, I told myself, but just dont know it. Youll feel it, when youve seen him on his own.—I thought we would find a way to meet, in a day or two. It was almost awo weeks, however, before we did. For of course, I had no

    reason for wandering, without Maud, into the grand parts of the house. I never saw the room he slept in, and he never came to mine. Besides, the days at Briar were run so very regular, it was quite like some great meical show, you could not ge it. The house bell woke us up in the ms, and after that we all went moving on our ways from room to room, on our set courses, until the bell rang us bato our beds at night. There might as well have been grooves laid for us in the floorboards; we might have glided on sticks. There might have been a great ha into the side of the house, and a great hand winding it.—Sometimes, when the view beyond the windows was dark rey with mist, I imagihat handle and thought that I could almost hear it turning. I grew afraid of what would happen if the turning was to stop.

    Thats what living in the try does to you.

    Wheleman came, the show gave a kind of jog. There was a growling of the levers, people quivering for a sed upon their sticks, the carving of one or two new grooves; and then it all went on, smooth as before, but with the ses in a different order. Maud did not go to her uncle, now, to read to him while he took notes. She kept to her rooms. We sat and sewed, or played at cards, or went walking to the river or to the yew trees and the graves.

    As fentleman: he rose at seven, and took his breakfast in his bed. He was served by Charles. At eight oclock he began his work on Mr Lillys pictures. Mr Lilly directed him. He was as mad over his pictures as he was over his books, and had fitted up a little room fentleman to work in, darker and closer even than his library. I suppose the pictures were old and pretty precious. I never saw them. Nobody did. Mr Lilly aleman carried keys about with them, and they locked the door to that room whether they were out of it or in it.

    They worked until one oclock, then took their lunch. Maud and I took ours alone. We ate in silence. She might  at all, but only sit waiting. Then, at a quarter to two, she would fetch out drawing-things—pencils and paints, papers and cards, a wooden triangle—and she would set them ready, very ly, in an order that was always the same. She would not let me help. If a brush fell and

    I caught it, she would take everything up—papers, pencils, paints, triangle—a out all ain.

    I learned not to touch. Only to watch. And then we would both listen, as the clock struck two. And at a mier that there would e Gentleman, to teach her her days lesson.

    At first, they kept to the parlour. He put an apple, a pear and a water-jug upon a table, and stood and nodded while she tried to paint them on a card. She was about as handy with a paint-brush as she would have been with a spade; but Gentleman would hold up the messes she made and tilt his head or screw up his eye and say,

    I declare, Miss Lilly, you are acquiring quite a method. Or,

    What an improvement, on your sketches from last month!

    Do you think so, Mr Rivers? she would answer, all in a blush. Is not the pear a little lean? Had I not ought to practise my perspective?

    The perspective is, perhaps, a little at fault, hed say. But you have a gift, Miss Lilly, which surpasses mere teique. You have an eye for an essence. I am almost afraid to stand before you! I am afraid of what might be uncovered, were you to turn that eye upon me.

    He would say something like that, in a voice that would start off strong and then grow sweet, and breathless, aating; and she would look as though she were a girl of wax and had moved too o a fire. She would try the fruit again. This time the pear would e out like a banana. Then G<mark></mark>entleman would say that the light oor, or the brush a bad one.

    If I might only take you to London, Miss Lilly, to my own studio there!

    That was the life he had faked up for himself—an artists life, in a house at Chelsea. He said he had many fasating artist friends. Maud said, Lady artist friends, too?

    Of course, he answered then. For I think that—then he shook his head—well, my opinions are irregular, and not to everyoaste. See here, try this line a little firmer.

    He went to her, and put his hand upon hers. She turned her face to his and said,

    Wont you tell me what it is you think? You might speak plainly. I am not a child, Mr Rivers!

    You are not, he said softly, gazing into her eyes. Then he gave a start. After all, he went on, my opinion is mild enough. It s your—your sex, and matters of creation. There is something, Miss Lilly, I think your sex must have.

    She swallowed. What is that, Mr Rivers?

    Why, the liberty, he answered gently, of mine.

    She sat still, then gave a wriggle. Her chair creaked, the sound seemed to startle her, and she drew her hand away. She looked up, to the glass, and found my eyes on her, and blushed; theleman looked up too, and watched her—that made her colour still harder and lower her gaze. He looked from her to me, then back tain. He lifted his hands to his whiskers and gave them a stroke.

    The her brush to the picture of the fruit, and—Oh! she cried. The paint ran like a tear-drop. Gentleman said she must not mind it, that he had worked her quite enough. He went to the table, took up the pear and rubbed the bloom from it. Maud kept a little pen-kh her brushes and leads, a this out and cut the pear into three wet slices. He gave oo her, kept one for himself, and the last he shook free of its juid brought to me.

    Almost ripe, I think, he said, with a wink.

    He put his slice of pear to his mouth and ate it in two sharp bites. It left beads of cloudy jui his beard. He licked his fingers, thoughtfully; and I licked mine; and Maud, for once, let her gloves grow stained, and sat with the fruit against her lip and nibbled at it, her look a dark one.

    We were thinking of secrets. Real secrets, and soo many to t. When I try now to sort out who knew what and who knew nothing, who knew everything and who was a fraud, I have to stop and give it up, it makes my head spin.

    At last he said she might try painting from nature. I guessed at once what that meant. It meant that he could take her wandering about the park, into all the shady, lonely places, and call it instru. I think she guessed it, too. Will it rain today, do you think?

    she asked in a worried sort of way, her face at the window, her eyes on the clouds. This was the end of February, and still cold as anything; but just as everyone in that house perked up a bit to see Mr Rivers e back to it again, so now even the weather seemed to lift and grow sweet. The wind fell off, and the windows stopped rattling. The sky turned pearly instead of grey. The lawns grew green as billiard tables.

    In the ms, when I walked with Maud, just the two of us, I walked at her side. Now, of course, she walked with Gentleman: he would offer her his arm and, after a show of hesitation, she would take it; I think she held it more easily, through having growo holding mine. She walked pretty stiffly, though; but then, he would find little artful ways to pull her closer. He would bend his head until it was near hers. He would pretend to brush dust from her collar. There would start off space between them, but steadily the space would close—at last, there would only be the rub of his sleeve upon hers, the bug of her skirt about his trousers. I saw it all; for I walked behind them. I carried her satchel of paints and brushes, her wooden triangle, and a stool. Sometimes they would draw away from me, and seem quite tet me. Then Maud would remember, and turn, and say,

    How good you are, Sue! You do not mind the walk? Mr Rivers thinks another quarter of a mile will do it.

    Mr Rivers always thought that. He kept her slowly walking about the park, saying he was looking for ses for her to paint, but really keeping her close and talking in murmurs; and I had to follow, with all their gear.

    Of course, I was the reason they were able to walk at all. I was meant to watd see that Gentleman roper.

    I watched him hard. I also watched her. She would look sometimes at his face; more often at the ground; now and then at some flower or leaf or fluttering bird that took her fancy. And when she did that he would half turn, and catch my eye, and give a devilish kind of smile; but by the time she gazed at him again his face would be smooth.

    You would swear, seeing him then, that he loved her.

    You would swear, seeihat she loved him.

    But you could see that she was fearful, of her own flutteri. He could not go too fast. He ouched her, except to let her lean upon his arm, and to guide her hand as she painted. He would bend close to her, to watch her as she dabbled in the colours, and then their breaths would e together and his hair would mix with hers; but if he went a little nearer she would flinch. She kept her gloves on.

    At last he found out that spot beside the river, and she began a painting of the sery there, adding more dark rushes each day. In the evening she sat reading in the drawing-room, for him and Mr Lilly. At night she went fretfully to her bed, and sometimes took more sleeping-drops, and sometimes shivered in her sleep.

    I put my hands upon her, when she did that, till she was still again.

    I was keeping her calm, fentlemans sake. Later on he would wao make her nervous; but for now I kept her calm, I kept her , I kept her dressed very handsome. I washed her hair in vinegar, and brushed it till it shone. Gentleman would e to her parlour and study her, and bow. And when he said, Miss Lilly, I believe you grow sweeter in the face with every day that passes!, I knew he meant it. But I koo, that he meant it as a pliment not to her—who had dohing—but to me, who did it all.

    I guessed little things like that. He couldnt speak plainly, but made great play with his eyes and with his smiles, as I have said. We waited out our ce for a talk in private; and just as it began to look as though that ce would never e, it did—and it was Maud, in her i way, who let us have it.

    For she saw him one m, very early, from the window of her room. She stood at the glass and put her head against it, and said,

    There is Mr Rivers, look, walking on the lawn.

    I went and stood beside her and, sure enough, there he was, strolling about the grass, smoking a cigarette. The sun, being still rather low, made his shadow very long.

    Aiall? I said, gazing sideways at Maud. She nodded. Her breath made the glass mist, and she wiped it away. Then she said,

    Oh!—as if he might have fallen over—Oh! I think his cigarette has go. Poor Mr Rivers!

    He was studying the dark tip of his cigarette, and blowing at it; now he utting his hand to his trouser pocket, searg for a match. Maud made another swipe at the window-glass.

    Now, she said,  he light it? Has he a match? Oh, I dont believe he does! And the clock struck the half, quite twenty minutes ago. He must go to Uncle soon. No, he does not have a match, in all those pockets ...&quot;

    She looked at me and wrung her hands, as if her heart was breaking.

    I said, It wont kill him, miss.

    But poor Mr Rivers, she said again. Oh, Sue, if you are quick, you might take a mat. Look, he is putting his cigarette away. How sad he looks now!

    We didnt have any matches. Margaret kept them in her apron. When I told Maud that she said,

    Then take a dle! Take anything! Take a coal from the fire! Oh, t you be quicker?—Dont say I sent you, mind!

    you believe she had me doing that?—tripping down two sets of stairs, with a lighted coal in a pair of fire-tongs, just so a man might have his m smoke?  you believe I did it? Well, I was a servant now, and must. Gentleman saw me stepping across the grass to him, saw what I carried, and laughed.

    I said, All right. She has sent me down with it for you to light yarette from. Look glad, she is watg. But make a business of it, if you want.

    He did not move his head, but raised his eyes to her window.

    What a good girl she is, he said.

    She is too good for you, that I do know.

    He smiled. But only as a gentleman should smile to a servant; and his face he made kind. I imagined Maud, looking down, breathing quicker upon the glass. He said quietly,

    How do we do, Sue?

    Pretty well, I answered.

    You think she loves me?

    I do. Oh, yes.

    He drew out a silver case and lifted free a cigarette. But she hasnt told you so?

    She dont have to.

    He leaned close to the coal. Does she trust you?

    I think she must. She has nobody else.

    He drew on the cigarette, thehed out in a sigh. The smoke staihe cold air blue. He said, Shes ours.

    He stepped back a little way, theured with his eyes; I saw what he wanted, let the coal fall to the lawn, aooped to help me get it. What else? he said. I told him, in a murmur, about the sleeping-drops, and about her being afraid of her own dreams. He listened, smiling, all the time fumbling with the fire-tongs over the piece of coal, and finally catg it up and rising, and plag my hands upon the handle of the tongs and pressing them tight.

    The drops and the dreams are good, he said quietly. Theyll help us, later. But you know, for now, what you must do? Watch her hard. Make her love you. Shes our little jewel, Suky. Soon I shall prise her from her setting and turn her into cash.—Keep it like this, he went on, in an ordinary voice. Mr Way had e to the front door of the house, to see why it en. Like this, so the coal wont fall and scorch Miss Lillys carpets . . .

    I made him a curtsey, and he moved away from me; and then, while Mr Way stepped out to bend his legs and look at the sun and push back his wig and scratch beh it, he said in one last murmur:

    They are plag bets on you, at Lant Street. Mrs Sucksby has five pounds on your success. I am charged to kiss you, in her behalf.

    He puckered up his lips in a silent kiss, then put his cigarette into the pucker and made more blue smoke. Then he bowed. His hair fell over his collar. He lifted up his white hand to brush it back behind his ear.

    From his pla the step, I saw Mr Way studying him rather as the hard boys of the Bh did—as if not quite sure what he wao do most: laugh at him, or punch his lights out. But

    Gentlema his eyes very i. He only lifted his face to the sun, and stretched, so that Maud might see him better from the shadows of her room.

    She stood and watched him walk and smoke his cigarette, every m  ifter that. She would stand at the window with her face pressed to the glass, and the glass would mark her brow with a circle of red—a perfect circle of crimson in her pale face. It was like the spot upon the cheek of a girl with a fever. I thought I saw it growing darker and fiercer with every day that passed.

    Now she watched Gentleman, and I watched them both; and the three of us waited for the fever to break.

    I had thought it might take two weeks, or three. But two weeks had gone by already, and we had got nowhere. Then awo passed, and it was all just the same. She was too good at waiting, and the house was too smooth. She would give a little jump out of her groove, to be o Gentleman; and he would sneak a little way out of his, to be closer to her; but that would only make new grooves for them to glide in. We he whole show to go bust.

    We needed her to grow fiding, so that I could help her on her way. But, though I dropped a thousand little hints—such as, what a kileman Mr Rivers was; and how handsome and how well-bred; and how her uncle seemed to like him; and how she seemed to like him, and how he seemed to like her; and if a lady ever thought of marrying, didnt she think a gent like Mr Rivers might be just the gent for the job?—though I gave her a thousand little ces like that, to open up her heart, she ook ohe weather turned cold again, then grew warmer. It got to March. Then it was almost April. By May, Mr Lillys pictures would all be mounted, aleman would have to leave. But still she said nothing; and he held back from pressing her, out of fear that a wrong move would frighten her off.

    I grew fretful, waiting. Gentleman grew fretful. We all grew nervy as narks—Maud would sit fidgeting for hours at a trot, and when the house clock sounded she would give a little start, that

    would make me start; and when it came time fentleman to call on her, I would see her fling, listening for his step—then his knock would e, and she would jump, or scream, or drop her cup and break it. Then at night, she would lie stiff and open-eyed, or turn and murmur in her sleep.

    All, I thought, for love! I had never seen anything like it. I thought about how such a business got worked out, in the Bh. I thought of all the things a girl could ordinarily do, when she liked a fellow that she guessed liked her.

    I thought of what I would do, if a man like Gentleman liked me.

    I thought perhaps I ought to take her aside and tell her, as one girl to another.

    Then I thought she might think me rude.—Which is pretty rum, in light of what happened later.

    But something else happened first. The fever broke at last. The show went bust, and all our waiting paid off.

    She let him kiss her.

    Not on her lips, but somewhere altogether better.

    I know, because I saw it.

    It was down by the river, on the first day of April. The weather was too warm for the time of year. The sun shone bright in a sky of grey, and everyone said there would be thunder.

    She had a jacket and a cloak above her gown, and was hot: she called me to her, and had me take away the cloak, and then the jacket. She was sitting at her painting of the rushes, aleman was near her, looking on and smiling. The sun made her squint: every now and then she would raise her hand to her eyes. Her gloves were quite spoiled with paint, and there aint upon her face.

    The air was thid warm and heavy, but the earth was cold to the touch: it had all the chill of winter in it still, and all the dampness of the river. The rushes smelt rank. There was a sound, as of a locksmiths file, that Gentleman said was bullfrogs. There were long-legged spiders, ales. There was a bush, with a show of tight, fat, furry buds.

    I sat beside the bush, ourned punt: Gentleman had carried it there for me, to the shelter of the wall. It was as far away from him and Maud as he dared place me. I kept the spiders from a basket of cakes. That was my job, while Maud painted, aleman looked on, smiling, and sometimes putting his hand on

    hers.

    She painted, and the queer hot su lower, the grey sky began to be streaked with red, and the air grew even thicker. And then I slept. I slept and dreamt of Lant Street—I dreamt of Mr Ibbs at his brazier, burning his hand and shouting. The shout woke me up. I started from the punt, not knowing for a sed where. I was. Then I looked about me. Maud aleman were o be seen.

    There was her stool, and there the terrible painting. There were her brushes—one was dropped upon the ground—and there her paints. I went over and picked up the fallen brush. I thought it would be like Gentleman, after all, to have taken her back to the house a me to e up, sweating, with everything behind them. But I could not imagihat she would go with him, alone. I felt almost afraid for her. I felt almost like a real maid, worried for her mistress.

    And then I heard her voice, murmuring. I walked a little way, and saw them.

    They had not gone far—only just along the river, where it bent about the wall. They did not hear me e, they did not look round. They must have walked together along the line of rushes; and then I suppose he had spoken to her at last. He had spoken, for the first time, without me to overhear him—and I wondered what words he had said, that could make her lean against him, like that. She had her head upon his collar. Her skirt rose at the back, almost to her knees. A, her face she kept turned hard from his. Her arms hung at her side, like a dolls arms. He moved his mouth against her hair, and whispered.

    Then, while I stood watg, he lifted one of her weak hands and slowly drew the glove half from it; and then he kissed her naked palm.

    And by that, I knew he had her. I think he sighed. I think she sighed, too—I saw her sag still closer to him, then give a shiver. Her skirt rose even higher, and showed the tops of her stogs, the white of her thigh.

    The air was thick as treacle. My gown was damp where it gripped. A limb of iron would have sweated, in a dress on such a day. An eye of marble would have swivelled in its socket to gaze as I did. I could not look away. The stillness of them—her hand, so pale against his beard, the glove still bunched about her knuckles, the lifted skirt—it seemed to hold me like a spell. The purr of the bullfrogs was louder than before. The river lapped like a tongue among the rushes. I watched, and he dipped his head, and softly kissed her again.

    I should have been glad to see him do it. I was not. Instead, I imagihe rub of his whiskers upon her palm. I thought of her smooth white fingers, her soft white nails.—I had cut them, that m. I had dressed her and brushed her hair. I had been keeping her,  and in her looks—all for the sake of this moment. All for him. Now, against the dark of his jacket and hair, she seemed so —so slight, so pale—I thought she might break. I thought he might swallow her up, or bruise her.

    I turned away. I felt the heat of the day, the thiess of the air, the rankness of the rushes, too hard; I turned, and stole softly back to where the painting was. After a mihere came thunder, and another mier that I heard the sound of skirts, and then Maud aleman walked quickly about the curving wall, she with her arm in his, her gloves buttoned up and her eyes on the ground; him with his hand upon her fingers, his head bent. When he saw me he gave me a look. He said,

    Sue! We didnt like to wake you. We have been walking, and lost ourselves in gazing at the river. Now the light is all gone, and we shall have rain, I think. Have you a coat for your mistress?

    I said nothing. Maud, too, was silent, and looked nowhere but at her feet. I put her cloak about her, then took the painting and the paints, the stool and the basket, and followed her aleman back, through the gate in the wall, to the house. Mr ehe

    door to us. As he closed it the thunder came again. Then the rain began to fall, i, dark, staining drops.

    Just in time! said Gentleman softly, gazing at Maud aing her draw her hand from him.

    It was the hand he had kissed. She must have felt his lips there still, for I saw her turn from him and hold it to her bosom, and stroke her fingers over her palm.

 Chapter Five

    The rain fell all that night. It made rivers of water that ran ^y beh the basement doors, into the kit, the still-room and the pantries. We had to cut short our supper so that Mr Way and Charles might lay down sacks. I stood with Mrs Stiles at a backstairs window, watg the boung raindrops and the flashes of lightning. She rubbed her arms and gazed at the sky.

    Pity the sailors at sea, she said.

    I went up early to Mauds rooms, and sat in the darkness, and when she came she did not know, for a mihat I was there: she stood and put her hands to her face. Then the lightning flashed again, and she saw me, and jumped.

    Are you here? she said.

    Her eyes seemed large. She had been with her uncle, and with Gentleman. I thought, Shell tell me now. But she only stood gazing at me, and whehunder sounded she turned and moved away. I went with her to her bedroom. She stood as weakly for me to

    undress her as she had stood ilemans arms, and the hand he had kissed she held <q></q>off a little from her side, as if to guard it. In her bed she lay very still, but lifted her head, now and then, from her pillow. There was a steady drip, drip in one of the attics. Do you hear the rain? she said; and then, in a softer voice: The thunder is moving away

    I thought of the basements, filling with water. I thought of the sailors at sea. I thought of the Bh. Rain makes London houses groan. I wondered if Mrs Sucksby was lying in bed, while the damp house groaned about her, thinking of me.

    Three thousand pounds! she had said. My crikey!

    Maud lifted her head again, and drew in her breath. I closed my eyes. Here it es, I thought.

    But after all, she said nothing.

    When I woke, the rain had stopped and the house was still. Maud lay, as pale as milk: her breakfast came and she put it aside and would  it. She spoke quietly, about nothing. She did not look or act like a lover. I thought she would say something lover-like soon, though. I supposed her feelings had dazed her.

    She watched Gentleman walk and smoke his cigarette, as she always did; and then, when he had goo Mr Lilly, she said she would like to walk, herself. The sun had e up weak. The sky was grey again, and the ground was filled with what seemed puddles of lead. The air was so washed and pure, it made me bilious. But we went, as usual, to the wood and the ice-house, and then to the chapel and the graves. When we reached her mrave she sat a little near it, and gazed at the sto was dark with rain. The grass between the graves was thin aen. Two or three great black birds walked carefully about us, looking for worms. I watched them peck. Then I think I must have sighed, for Maud looked at me and her face—that had been hard, through frowning—grew gentle. She said,

    You are sad, Sue.

    I shook my head.

    I think you are, she said. Thats my fault. I have brought you to

    this lonely place, time after time, thinking only of myself. But you have known what it is, to have a mothers love and then to lose it.

    I looked away.

    Its all right, I said. It doesnt matter.

    She said, You are brave ...&quot;

    I thought of my mother, dying game on the scaffold; and I suddenly wished—what I had never wished before—that she had been some ordinary girl, that had died in a regular way. As if she guessed it, Maud said quietly now,

    And what—it doesnt trouble you, my asking?—what did your mother die of?

    I thought for a moment. I said at last that she had swalloin, that had choked her.

    I really did know a woman that died that way. Maud stared at me, and put her hand to her throat. Then she gazed down at her own mothers tomb.

    How would you feel, she said quietly, if you had fed her that pin yourself?

    It seemed an odd sort of question; but, of course, I was used by now to her saying odd sorts of things. I told her I should feel very ashamed and sad.

    Would you? she said. You see, I have an i in knowing. For it was my birth that killed my mother. I am as to blame for her death as if I had stabbed her with my own hand!

    She looked strangely at her fingers, that had red earth at the tips. I said,

    What nonsense. Who has made you think that? They ought to be sorry.

    No-one made me think it, she answered. I thought it myself.

    Then thats worse, because youre clever and ought to know better. As if a girl could stop herself from being born!

    I wish I had been stopped! she said. She almost cried it. One of the dark birds started up from betweeones, its wings beating the air—it sounded like a carpet being snapped out of a window. We both turned our heads to see it fly; and when I looked at her again, her eyes had tears in them.

    I thought, What do you have to cry for? Youre in love, youre in love. I tried to remind her.

    Mr Rivers, I began. But she heard the name and shivered.

    Look at the sky, she said quickly. The sky had grown darker. I think it will thunder again. Here is the new rain, look!

    She closed her eyes ahe rain fall on her face, and after another sed I could not have said what were raindrops, and what tears. I went to her and touched her arm.

    Put your cloak about you, I said. Now the rain fell quid hard. She let me lift her hood and fasten it, as a child might; and I think, if I had not drawn her from the grave, she would have stayed there and been soaked. But I made her stumble with me to the door of the little chapel. It was shut up fast with a rusting  and a padlock, but above it orch of rotted wood. The rain struck the wood and made it tremble. Our skirts were dark with water at the hems. We stood close to one another, our shoulders tight against the chapel door, and the rain came down—straight down, like arrows. A thousand arrows and one poor heart. She said,

    Mr Rivers has asked me to marry him, Sue.

    She said it in a flat voice, like a girl saying a lesson; and though I had waited so hard to hear her say it, when I answered my words came out heavy as hers. I said,

    Oh, Miss Maud, I am gladder than anything!

    A drop of rain fell between our faces.

    Are you truly? she said. Her cheeks were damp, her hair ging to them. Then, she went on miserably, I am sorry. For I have not told him yes. How  I? My uncle— My uncle will never give me up. It wants four years until I am twenty-one. How  I ask Mr Rivers to wait so long?

    Of course, we had guessed shed think that. We had hoped that she would; for in thinking it shed be all the more ready to run and be married i. I said, carefully, Are you sure, about your uncle?

    She nodded. He will not spare me, so long as there are books still, to be read and noted; and there will always be those! Besides, he is proud. Mr Rivers, I know, is a gentlemans son, but—

    But your uncle wont think him quite enough a swell?

    She bit her lip. Im afraid that if he knew Mr Rivers had asked for my hand, he would send him from the house. But then, he must go anyway, when his work here is finished! He must go— Her voice shook. And how will I see him, then? How may you keep a heart, for four years, like that?

    She put her hands to her fad wept in ear. Her shoulders jumped. It was awful to see. I said, You mustnt cry. I touched her cheek, putting the damp hair from it. I said, Truly, miss, you mustnt cry. Do you think Mr Rivers will give you up now? How could he? You mean more to him than anything. Your uncle will e round, when he sees that.

    My happiness is nothing to him, she said. Only his books! He has made me like a book. I am not meant to be taken, and touched, and liked. I am meant to keep here, in a dim light, for ever!

    She spoke more bitterly than I had ever heard her speak before. I said,

    Your uncle loves you, Im sure. But Mr Rivers— The wot caught in my throat, and I coughed. Mr Rivers loves you, too.

    You think he does, Sue? He spoke so fiercely yesterday, beside the river, while you slept. He spoke of London—of his house, his studio—he says he longs to take me there, not as his pupil, but as his wife. He says he thinks of nothing but that. He says he thinks that to wait for me will kill him! You think he means it, Sue?

    She waited. I thought, Its not a lie, its not a lie, he loves her for her money. I think he would die if he lost it now. I said,

    I know it, miss.

    She looked at the ground. But, what  he do?

    He must ask your uncle.

    He ot!

    Then—I drew in my breath—you must find another way. She said nothing, but moved her head. You must do that. Still nothing. Isnt there, I said, another way you might take . . .?

    She lifted her eyes to mine and blinked back her tears. She looked anxiously to left and tht, then drew a little closer. She said, in a whisper:

    Youll tell no-one, Sue?

    Tell them what, miss?

    She blinked agaiating. You must promise not to tell. You must swear it!

    I swear! I said. I swear!—all the time thinking, e on, say it Now!—for it was dreadful, seeing her so afraid to give up her secret, when I knew what the secret was.

    Then she did say it. Mr Rivers, she said, more quietly than ever, says we might go away, at night.

    At night! I said.

    He says we might be privately married. He says my uncle might try to claim me then; but he does not think he will. Not once I am a—a wife.

    Her face, as she said the wrew pale, I saw the blood fall out of her cheek. She looked at the stone on her mrave. I said,

    You must follow your heart, miss.

    I am not sure. After all, I am not sure.

    But to love, and then to lose him! Her gaze grew strange. I said, You love him, dont you?

    She turned a little, and still looked queer, and would not ahen she said,

    I dont know.

    Dont know? How  you not know a thing like that? Doesnt your blood beat hard when you see him ing? Doesnt his voice thrill in your ears, and his touch set you shaking? Dont you dream of him, at night?

    She bit her plump lip. And those things mean I love him?

    Of course! What else could they mean?

    She did not answer. Instead, she closed her eyes and gave a shiver. She put her hands together, and agairoked the spot upon her palm where he had yesterday touched his lips.

    Only now I saw, she was not stroking the flesh so much as rubbing at it. She was not nursing the kiss. She felt his mouth like a burn, like an itch, like a splinter, and was trying to rub the memory of it away.

    She didnt love him at all. She was afraid of him.

    I drew in my breath. She opened her eyes and held my gaze.

    What will you do? I said, in a whisper.

    What  I do? She shivered. He wants me. He has asked me. He means to make me his.

    You might—say no.

    She blinked, as if she could not believe I had said it. I could not believe it, either.

    Say no to him? she said slowly. Say no? Then her look ged. And watch him leave, from my window? Or perhaps when he goes I shall be in my uncles library, where the windows are all dark; and then I shant see him leave at all. And then, and then—oh, Sue, dont you think I should wonder, over the life I might have had? Do you suppose another man will e visiting, that will want me half as much as he? What choice have I?

    Her gaze, now, was so steady and so bare, I flinched from it. I did not answer for a moment, but turned and gazed down at the wood of the door we stood against, and the rusting  that held it closed, and the padlock. The padlock is the simplest kind of lock. The worst are the kind that keep their business parts guarded. They are devils to crack. Mr Ibbs taught me that. I closed my eyes and saw his face; and then, Mrs Sucksbys. Three thousand pounds—. I drew in my breath, looked baaud, and said,

    Marry him, miss. Dont wait for your uncles word. Mr Rivers loves you, and love wont harm a flea. You will learn to like him as you ought, in time. Till then go with him i, and do everything he says.

    For a sed, she looked wretched—as if she might have been hoping I would say anything but that; but it was only for a sed. Then her face grew clear. She said,

    I will. Ill do it. But, I t go alone. You mustnt make me go with him, quite on my own. You must e with me. Say you will. Say youll e and be my maid, in my new life, in London!

    I said I would. She gave a high, nervous laugh and then, from havi and been so low, she grew almost giddy. She talked of the house that Gentleman had promised her; and of the fashions of London, that I would help her choose; and of the carriage she

    would have. She said she would buy me handsome gowns. She said she wouldnt call me her maid then, but her panion. She said she would get me a maid of my own.

    For you know I shall be very rich, she said simply, once I am married?

    She shivered and smiled and clutched at my arm, and then she drew me to her and put her head against mine. Her cheek was cool, and smooth as a pearl. Her hair was bright with beads of rainwater. I think she was weeping. But I did not pull away to try and find out. I did not wao see my face. I think the look in my eyes must have been awful.

    That afternoo out her paints and her painting, as usual; but the brushes and the colours stayed dry. Gentleman came to her parlour, walked quickly to her, and stood before her as if he loo pull her to him but was afraid. He said her  Miss Lilly, but Maud. He said it in a quiet, fierce voice, and she quivered, aated ohen nodded. He gave a great sigh, seized her hand and sank before her—I thought that ushing it a bit, myself, and even she looked doubtful. She said, No, not here! and gazed quickly at me; and he, seeing her look, said, But we may be quite free, before Sue? Youve told her? She knows all? He turo me with an awkward gesture of his head, as if it hurt his eyes to look at anything but her.

    Ah, Sue, he said, if you were ever a friend to your mistress, be her friend now! If you ever looked kindly on a pair of foolish lovers, look kindly on us!

    He gazed hard at me. I gazed hard back.

    She has promised to help us, said Maud. But, Mr Rivers—

    Oh, Maud, he said at that. Do you mean to slight me?

    She lowered her head. She said, Richard, then.

    Thats better.

    He was still on his knee, with his face tilted upwards. She touched his cheek. He turned his head and kissed her hands, and then she drew them quickly back. She said,

    Sue will help us all she . But we must be careful, Richard.

    He smiled and shook his head. He said,

    And you think, seeing me now, I shall never be that? He rose and stepped from her. He said, Do you know how careful my love will make me? See here, look at my hands. Say theres a cobweb spuween them. Its my ambition. And at its tre theres a spider, of the colour of a jewel. The spider is you. This is how I shall bear you—so gently, so carefully and without jar, you shall not know you are being taken.

    He said that, with his white hands cupped; and then, as she gazed into the space between them, he spread his fingers and laughed. I turned away. When I looked at her again, he had taken her hands in his and was holding them loosely, before his heart. She seemed a little easier. They sat, and talked in murmurs.

    And I remembered all she had said at the graves, and how she had rubbed her palm. I thought, That was nothing, she has fotten it now. Not love him, when hes so handsome and seems so kind?

    I thought, Of course she loves him. I watched as he leao her and touched her and made her blush. I thought, Who wouldnt?

    Then he raised his head and caught my gaze and, stupidly, I blushed, too. He said,

    You know your duties, Sue. Youve a careful eye. We shall be glad of that, in time. But today—well, have you no other little business, that will take you elsewhere?

    He gestured with his eyes to the door of Mauds bedroom.

    Theres a shilling in it for you, he said, if you do.

    I almost stood. I almost went. So used had I got, to playing the servant. Then I saw Maud. The colour had quite gone from her face. She said, But suppose Margaret or one of the girls should e to the door?

    Why should they do that? said Gentleman. And if they do, what will they hear? We shall be perfectly silent. Then they will go again. He smiled at me. Be kind, Sue, he said slyly. Be kind, to lovers. Did you never have a sweetheart of your own?

    I might still have gone, before he said that. Now I thought suddenly, Who did he think he was? He might pretend to be a lord; he

    was only a an. He had a snide ring on his finger, and all his s were bad ones. I knew more than he did about Mauds secrets. I slept beside her in her own bed. I had made her love me like a sister; he had made her afraid. I could turn her heart against him if I wao, like that! It was enough that he was going to marry her at last. It was enough that he could kiss her, whenever he liked. I wouldnt leave her now to be tugged about and made nervous. I thought, Damn you, Ill get my three thousand just the same!

    So I said, I shant leave Miss Lilly. Her uncle wouldnt like it. And if Mrs Stiles was to hear of it, then I should lose my place.

    He looked at me and frowned. Maud did not look at me at all; but I knew she was grateful. She said gently,

    After all, Richard, we shouldnt ask too much of Sue. We shall have time enough to be together, soon—shant we?

    He said then that he supposed that that was true. They kept close before the fire, and after a while I went and sat and sewed beside the window ahem gaze at one anothers faces undisturbed. I heard the hiss of his whispers, the rush of his breath as he laughed. But Maud was silent. And when he left, and took her hand and pressed it to his mouth, she trembled so hard, I thought back to all the times I had watched her tremble before, and wondered how I had ever mistaken that trembling for love. Ohe door was closed she stood at the glass, as she often did, studying her face. She stood there for a mihen turned. She stepped very slowly and softly, from the glass to the sofa, from the sofa to the chair, from the chair to the window—she moved, in short, across the whole of the room, until she reached my side. She leao look at my work and her hair, in its  of velvet, brushed my own.

    You sew ly, she said—though I had not, not then. I had sewn hard, and my stitches were crooked.

    Theood and said nothing. Once or twice she drew in her breath. I thought there was something she loo ask me, but dared not. In the end she moved away again.

    And so our trap—that I had thought so lightly of, and worked so hard to lay—was finally set; and wanted only藏书网 time to go quickly by

    and spring it. Gentleman was hired to work as Mr Lillys secretary until the end of April, a to stay out his tract to the last—So that the old man wont have the breaking of that to charge me with, he said to me, laughing, alongside the breaking of certain other things. He plao leave when he was meant to—that is, the evening of the last day of the month; but, instead of taking the train for London, he would hang about, and e back to the house at the dead of night, for me and Maud. He must steal her away and not be caught, and then he must marry her—quick as he could, and before her uncle should hear of it and find her and take her home again. He had it all figured out. He could not fetch her in a pony and cart, for he should never have got it past the gate-house. He meant t a boat and take her off along the river, to some small out-of-the-way church where she would not be known as Mr Lillys niece.

    Now, to marry a girl at any churust have been living in the parish of it for fifteen days; but he fixed that up, as he fixed everything. A few days after Maud had promised him her hand, he found some excuse and took a horse a riding off to Maidenhead. He got a special lice for the wedding there—that meant they should not have to put out the banns—and then he went about the ty, looking out for the right kind of church. He found one, in a plaall and broken-down it had no name—or anyway, thats what he told us. He said the vicar was a drunkard. Hard by the church there was a cottage, owned by a ho kept black-faced pigs. For two pounds she said she would keep him a room and swear to whoever he liked that he had lived there a month.

    Women like that will do anything fentlemen like him. He got back to Briar that night looking pleased as a weasel, and handsome than ever; and he came to Mauds parlour and sat us down anc spoke to us in murmurs of all he had done.

    When he had finished, Maud looked pale. She had begun to leave off eating, and was grown thin about the face. Her eyes were dark at the lids. She put her hands together.

    Three weeks, she said.

    I thought I knew what she meant. She had three weeks left to

    make herself want him. I saw her ting the days in her head, and thinking.

    She was thinking of what was ing at the end of them.

    For, she never learo love him. She never grew to like his kisses or the feel of his hand upon hers. She still shrank from him in a miserable fright—then nerved herself to face him, let him draw her close, let him touch her hair and face. I supposed at first he thought her backwards. Then I guessed he liked her to be slow. He would be kind to her, then pressing, and then, when she greard or fused he would say,

    Oh! now you are cruel. I think you mean only to practise on my love.

    No indeed, she would answer. No, how  you say it?

    I dont think you love me as you ought.

    Not love you?

    You wont show it. Perhaps—and here hed give a sly glao catch my eye—perhaps theres someone else you care for?

    Then she would let him kiss her, as if to prove that there was not. She would be stiff, or weak as a puppet. Sometimes she would almost weep. Then he would fort her. He would call himself a brute that did not deserve her, that ought to give her up to a better lover; then she would let him kiss her again. I heard the meeting of their lips, from my cold place beside the window. I heard the creeping of his hand upon her skirt. Now and then I would look—just to be sure he had not put her in too much of a fright. But then, I didnt know what was worse—seeing her face shut up, her cheek made pale, her mouth against his beard; or meeting her eye as the tears were pressed from it and came spilling.

    Let her alone, why dont you? I said to him one day, when she had been called from the room to find a book for her uncle. t you see she dont care for it, having you pestering her like that?

    He looked at me queerly for a sed; then raised his brows. Not care for it? he said. She is longing for it.

    She is afraid of you.

    She is afraid of herself. Girls like her always are. But let them squirm and be dainty as much as they like, they all want the same thing in the end.

    He paused, then laughed. He thought it a filthy kind of joke.

    What she wants from you is to be taken from Briar, I said. For the rest, she knows nothing.

    They all say they know nothing, he answered, yawning. In their hearts, in their dreams, they know it all. They take it in their milk from the breasts of their mothers. Havent you heard her, in her bed? Doesnt she wriggle, and sigh? She is sighing for me. You must listen harder. I ought to e and listen with you. Shall I do that? Shall I e to your room, tonight? You could take me to her. We could watch to see how hard her heart beats. You could put back her gown for me to see.

    I knew he was teasing. He would never have risked losing everything, for a lark like that. But I heard his words, and imagined him ing. I imagined putting back her gown. I blushed, and turned away from him. I said,

    You should never find my room.

    I should find it, all right. Ive had the plan of the house, from the little knife-boy. Hes a good little boy, with a chattering mouth. He laughed again, rather harder, and stretched in his chair. Only think of the sport! And how would it harm her? I would creep, like a mouse. I am good at creeping. I would only want to look. Or, she might like to wake and fihere—like the girl in the poem.

    I kneoems. They were all about thieves being plucked by soldiers from their sweethearts arms; and one was about a cat being tipped down a well. I didnt know the one he mentioned now, however, and not knowing made me peevish.

    You leave her alone, I said. Perhaps he heard something in my voice. He looked me over, and his voice turned rich.

    Oh, Suky, he said, have you grown squeamish? Have you learned sweet ways, after your spell with the quality? Who would have said you should take so t ladies, with pals like yours, and a home like your home! What would Mrs Sucksby say—and Dainty, and Johnny!—if they could see your blushes now?

    They would say I had a soft heart, I said, firing up. Maybe I do. Wheres the crime in that?

    God damn it, he answered, firing up in his turn. What did a soft heart ever dirl like you? What would it do, firl like Dainty? Except, perhaps, kill her. He o the door through which Maud had goo her uncle. Do you suppose, he said, she wants your qualms? She wants yrip, on the laces of her stays— on her b, on the handle of her chamber-pot. Fods sake, look at you! I had turned and picked up her shawl, and begun to fold it. He pulled it from my hands. When did you bee so meek, so tidy? What do you imagine you owe, to her? Listen to me. I know her people. Im one of them. Dont talk to me as if she keeps you at Briar for kindness sake—nor as if you came out of sweetness of temper! Your heart—as you call it—and hers are alike, after all: they are like mine, like everyohey resemble nothing so much as those meters you will find on gas-pipes: they only perk up and start pumping when you drop s in. Mrs Sucksby should have taught you that.

    Mrs Sucksby taught me lots of things, I said, and not what you are saying now.

    Mrs Sucksby kept you too close, he answered. Too close. The boys of the Bh are right, calling you slow. Too close, too long. Too much like this. He showed me his fist.

    Go and fuck it, I said.

    At that his cheeks, behind his whiskers, grew crimson, and I thought he might get up and hit me. But he only leaned forward in his seat, and reached to grip the arm of my chair. He said quietly,

    Let me see you in your tantrums again and I will drop you, Sue, like a stone. Do you uand me? I have e far enough now, to do without you if I must. She will do anything I tell her. And say my old nurse, in London, should grow suddenly sick, and need her o tend her? What would you do then? Should you like to put on your old stuff gown again, and go back to Lant Street with nothing?

    I said,I should tell Mr Lill>９９ｌｉb?</a>y!

    Do you think he would have you in his room, long enough to hear you?

    Then, I should tell Maud.

    Go ahead. And why not tell her, while you are about it, that I have a tail with a point, and cloven hooves? So I would have, were I to act my crimes upoage. No-one expects to meet a man like me in life, however. She would choose not to believe you. She ot afford to believe you! For she has e as far as we have, and must marry me now, or be more or less ruined. She must do as I say—or stay here, and do nothing, for the rest of her life. Do you think shell do that?

    What could I say? She had as good as told me herself that she would not. So I was silent. But from that point on, I think I hated him. He sat with his hand on my chair, his eyes on mine, for another moment or two; then there came the pat of Mauds slippers oairs, and after a sed her face about the door. And then, of course, he sat bad his look ged. He rose, and I rose, and I made a hopeless sort of curtsey. He went quickly to her and led her to the fire.

    You are cold, he sa<s>藏书网</s>id.

    They stood before the mantel, but I saw their faces in the glass. She looked at the coals in the hearth. He gazed at me. Then he sighed and shook his hateful head.

    Oh, Sue, he said, you are terribly stern today.

    Maud looked up. Whats this? she said.

    I swallowed, saying nothing. He said,

    Poor Sue is weary of me. Ive been teasing her, while you were gone.

    Teasing her, how? she asked, half-smiling, half-frowning.

    Why, by keeping her from her sewing, by talking of nothing but you! She claims to have a soft heart. She has  at all. I told her my eyes were ag for want of gazing at you; she told me to  them in flannel ao my room. I said my ears were ringing, for want of your sweet voice; she wao call for Margaret t castor-oil to put in them. I showed her this blameless white hand, that wants your kisses. She told me to take it and— He paused.

    And what? said Maud.

    Well, put it in my pocket.

    He smiled. Maud looked o me, in a doubtful oor hand, she said at last.

    He lifted his arm. It still wants your kisses, he said.

    She hesitated, then took his hand and held it in her own two slender ones and touched his fingers, at the knuckles, with her lips.—Not there, he said quickly, when she did that. Not there, but here.

    He turned his wrist and showed his palm. She hesitated again, then dipped her head to it. It covered her mouth, her nose, and half her face.

    He caught my eye, and nodded. I turned away and wouldnt look at him.

    For he was right, damn him. Not about Maud—for I khat, whatever he said about hearts and gas-pipes, she was sweet, she was kind, she was everything that was gentle and handsome and good. But, he was right about me. How could I go back to the Bh, with nothing? I was meant to make Mrs Sucksbys fortune. How could I go back to her, and to Mr Ibbs—and to John—saying, I had thrown off the plot, let slip three thousand pounds, because—

    Because what? Because my feelings were fihan I thought? They would say my nerve had failed me. They would laugh in my face! I had a certain standing. I was the daughter of a murderess. I had expectations. Fine feelings werent in them. How could they be?

    And then, say I gave it all up—how would that save Maud? Say I went home: Gentleman would go on and marry her, and lock her up anyway. Or, say I peached him up. He would be sent from Briar, Mr Lilly would keep her all the closer—she might as well be put in a madhouse, theher way, I didnt say much to her ces.

    But her ces had all bee her, years before. She was like a twig on a rushing river. She was like milk—too pale, too pure, too simple. She was made to be spoiled.

    Besides, nobodys ces were good, where I came from. And though she was to do badly, did that mean I must?

    I didnt think it did. So though, as I have said, I was sorry for her,

    I was not quite sorry enough to want to try and save her. I never really thought of tellihe truth, of showing up Gentleman as the villain he was—of doing anything, anything at all, that would spoil our plot and keep us from our fortune. I let her suppose he loved her and was kind. I let her think that he was gentle. I watched her try to make herself like him, knowing all the time that he meant to take her, trick her, fuck her and lock her away. I watched her grow thin. I watched her pale and dwindle. I watched her sit with her head in her hands, passing the points of her fingers across her ag brow, wishing she might be a herself, Briar any house but her uncles, Gentleman any man but the man she must marry; and I hated it, but turned away. I thought, It t be helped. I thought, Its their business.

    But, here was a curious thing. The more I tried to give up thinking of her, the more I said to myself, Shes nothing to you, the harder I tried to pluck the idea of her out of my heart, the more she stayed there. All day I sat or walked with her, so full of the fate I was bringio I could hardly touch her or meet her gaze; and all night I lay with my back turo her, the bla over my ears to keep out her sighs. But in the hours iween, when she went to her uncle, I felt her—I felt her, through the walls of the house, like some blind crooks are said to be able to feel gold. It was as if there had e between us, without my knowing, a kind of thread. It pulled me to her, wherever she was. It was like—

    Its like you love her, I thought.

    It made a ge i made me nervous and afraid. I thought she would look at me a—entleman would, or Margaret, or Mrs Stiles. I imagined word of it getting back to Lant Street, reag John—I thought of John, more than any of them. I thought of his look, his laugh. What have I done? I imagined Id say. I havent done anything! And I hadnt. It was only, as Ive said, that I thought of her so, that I felt her so. Her very clothes seemed ged to me, her shoes and stogs: they seemed to keep her shape, the warmth and st of her—I didnt like to fold them up and make them flat. Her rooms seemed ged. I took to going about them—just as I had done, on my first day at Briar—

    and looking at all the things I knew she had taken up and touched. Her box, and her mothers picture. Her books. Would there be books for her, at the madhouse? Her b, with hairs snagged in it. Would there be ao dress her hair? Her looking-glass. I began to stand where she liked to stand, close to the fire, and Id study my face as Id seeudying hers.

    Ten days to go, I would say to myself. Ten days, and you will be rich!

    But Id say it, and across the words might e the chiming of the great house bell; and then I would shudder to think of our plot being so much as a single hour s end, the jaws of our trap that little bit closer and tighter about her and harder to prise apart.

    Of course, she felt the passing hours, too. It made her g to her old habits—made her walk, eat, lie in her bed, do everything, more stiffly, more ly, more like a little clockwork doll, than ever. I think she did it, for safetys sake; or else, to keep the time from running on too fast. Id watch her take her tea—pick up her cup, sip from it, put it down, pick it up and sip again, like a mae would; or Id see her sew, with crooked stitches, nervous and quick; and Id have to turn my gaze. Id think of the time I had put back the rug and danced a polka with her. Id think of the day I had smoothed her poiooth. I remembered holding her jaw, and the damp of her to had seemed ordinary, then; but I could not imagine, now, putting a fio her mouth and it being ordinary . . .

    She began to dream again. She began to wake, bewildered, in the night. Once or twice she rose from her bed: I opened my eyes and found her moving queerly about the room. Are you there? she said, when she heard me stirring; and she came bay side and lay and shook. Sometimes she would reae. When her hands came against me, though, shed draw them away. Sometimes she would weep. Or, she would ask queer questions. Am I real? Do you see me? Am I real?

    Go back to sleep, I said, one night. It was a night close to the end.

    Im afraid to, she said. Oh, Sue, Im afraid . . .

    Her voice, this time, was not at all thick, but soft and clear, and so unhappy it woke me properly and I looked for her face. I could not see it. The little rush-light that she always kept lit must have fallen against its shade, or burself out. The curtains were down, as they always were. I think it was three or four oclock. The bed was dark, like a box. Her breath came out of the darkness. It struck my mouth.

    &quot;What is it? I said.

    She said, I dreamed— I dreamed I was married

    I turned my head. Then her breath came against my ear. Too loud, it seemed, in the silence. I moved my head again. I said,

    Well, you shall be married, soon, for real.

    Shall I?

    You know you shall. Now, go back to sleep.

    But, she would not. I felt her lying, still but very stiff. I felt the beating of her heart. At last she said again, in a whisper: Sue—

    What is it, miss?

    She wet her mouth. Do you think me good? she said.

    She said it, as a child might. The words unnerved me rather. I turned again, and peered into the darkness, to try and make out her face.

    Good, miss? I said, as I squinted.

    You do, she said unhappily.

    Of course!

    I wish you wouldnt. I wish I wasnt. I wish— I wish I was wise.

    I wish you were sleeping, I thought. But I did not say it. What I said was, Wise? Arent you wise? A girl like you, that has read all those books of your uncles?

    She did not answer. She only lay, stiff as before. But her heart beat harder—I felt it lurch. I felt her draw in her breath. She held it. Then she spoke.

    Sue, she said, I wish you would tell me—

    Tell me the truth, I thought she was about to say; and my ow beat like hers, I began to sweat. I thought, She knows. She has guessed!—I almost thought, Thank God!

    But it wasnt that. It wasnt that, at all. She drew in her breath

    again, and again I felt her, nerving herself to ask some awful thing. I should have known what it was; for she had been nerving herself to ask it, I think, for a month. At last, the words burst from her.

    I wish you would tell me, she said, what it is a wife must do, on her wedding-night!

    I heard her, and blushed. Perhaps she did, too. It was too dark to see.

    I said, Dont you know?

    I know there is—something.

    But you dont know what?

    How should I?

    But truly, miss: you mean, you dont know?

    How should I? she cried, rising up from her pillow. Dont you see, dont you see? I am too ignorant even to know what it is I am ignorant of! She shook. Then I felt her make herself steady. I think, she said, in a flat, unnatural voice, I think he will kiss me. Will he do that?

    Again, I felt her breath on my face. I felt the word, kiss. Again, I blushed.

    Will he? she said.

    Yes, miss.

    I felt her nod. On my cheek? she said. My mouth?

    On your mouth, I should say.

    On my mouth. Of course . . . She lifted her hands to her face: I saw at last, through the darkness, the whiteness of her gloves, heard the brushing of her fingers across her lips. The sound seemed greater than it ought to have dohe bed seemed closer and blacker than ever. I wished the rush-light had not burned out. I wished—I think it was the only time I ever did—that the clock would chime. There was only the silence, with her breath in it. Only the darkness, and her pale hands. The world might have shrunk, or fallen away.

    What else, she asked, will he wao do?

    I thought, Say it quick. Quick will be best. Quid plain. But it was hard to be plain, with her.

    He will want, I said, after a moment, to embrace you.

    Her hand grew still. I think she blinked. I think I heard it. She said,

    You mean, to stand with me in his arms?

    She said it, and I pictured her, all at once, ilemans grip. I saw them standing—as you do see men and girls, sometimes, at night, in the Bh, in doorways or up against walls. You turn your eyes. I tried to turn my eyes, now—but, of course, could not, for there was nothing to turo, there was only the darkness. My mind flung figures on it, bright as lantern slides.

    I grew aware of her, waiting. I said, in a fretful way,

    He wont want to stand. Its rough, when you stand. You only stand when you havent a place to lie in or must be quick. A gentleman would embrace his wife on a couch, or a bed. A bed would be best.

    A bed, she said, like this?

    Perhaps like this.—Though the feathers, I think, would be devils to shake bato shape, when youve finished!

    I laughed; but the laugh came out too loud. Maud flihen she seemed to frown.

    Finished . . . she murmured, as if puzzling over the word. Then, Finished what? she said. The embrace?

    Fi, I said.

    But do you mean, the embrace?

    Fi. I turhen turned again. How dark it is! Where is the light?—Fi.  I be plainer?

    I think you could be, Sue. You talk instead of beds, of feathers. What are they to me? You talk of it. Whats it?

    It is what follows, I said, from kissing, from embrag on a bed. It is the actual thing. The kissing only starts you off. Then it es over you, like—like wanting to dao a time, to music. Have you never—?

    Never what?

    Never mind, I said. I still moved, restlessly. You must not mind. It will be easy. Like dang is.

    But dang is not easy, she said, pressing on. One must be taught to dance. You taught me.

    This is different.

    Why is it?

    There are lots of ways to dance. You  only do this, one way. The way will e to you, when once you have begun.

    I felt her shake her head. I dont think, she said miserably, it will e to me. I dont think that kisses  start me off. Mr Riverss kisses never have. Perhaps—perhaps my mouth lacks a certain necessary muscle or nerve—?

    I said, Fods sake, miss. Are you a girl, or a surgeon? Of course your mouth will work. Look here. She had fired me up. She had wouight, like a spring. I rose from my pillow. Where are your lips? I said.

    My lips? she answered, in a tone of surprise. They are here.

    I found them, and kissed her.

    I knew how to do it all right, for Dainty had shown me, once. Kissing Maud, however, was not like kissing her. It was like kissing the darkness. As if the darkness had life, had a shape, had taste, was warm and glib. Her mouth was still, at first. Then it moved against mihen it opened. I felt her tongue. I felt her swallow. I felt—

    I had do, only to show her. But I lay with my mouth on hers a, starting up in me, everything I had said would start in her, wheleman kissed her. It made me giddy. It made me blush, worse than before. It was like liquor. It made me drunk. I drew away. When her breath came now upon my mouth, it came very cold. My mouth was wet, from hers. I said, in a whisper,

    Do you feel it?

    The words sounded queer; as if the kiss had done something to my tongue. She did not answer. She did not move. She breathed, but lay so still I thought suddenly, What if Ive put her in a trance? Say she never es out? What ever will I tell her uncle—?

    Then she shifted a little. And then she spoke.

    I feel it, she said. Her voice was as strange as mine. You have made me feel it. Its such a curious, wanting thing. I never—

    It wants Mr Rivers, I said.

    Does it?

    I think it must.

    I dont know. I dont know.

    She spoke, unhappily. But she shifted again, and the shift brought her o me. Her mouth came closer to mi was like she hardly knew what she was doing; or knew, but could not help it. She said again, Im afraid.

    Dont be frightened, I said at once. For I khat she musthat. Say she got shtened she cried off marrying him?

    Thats what I thought. I thought I must show her how to do it, or her fear would spoil our plot. So, I kissed her again. Then I touched her. I touched her face. I began at the meeting of our mouths—at the soft wet ers of our lips—then found her jaw, her cheek, her brow— I had touched her before, to wash and dress her; but never like this. So smooth she was! So warm! It was like I was calling the heat and shape of her out of the darkness—as if the darkness was turning solid and growing quick, under my hand.

    She began to shake. I supposed she was still afraid. Then I began to shake, too. I fot to think of Gentleman, after that. I thought only of her. When her face greith tears, I kissed them away.

    You pearl, I said. So white she was! You pearl, you pearl, you pearl.

    It was easy to say, in the darkness. It was easy to do. But  m I woke, saw the strips of grey light between the curtains of the bed, remembered what I had done, and thought, My God. Maud lay, still sleeping, her brows drawn together in a frown. Her mouth en. Her lip had grown dry. My lip was dry, too, and I brought up my hand, to touch it. Then I took the hand away. It smelt of her. The smell made me shiver, ihe shiver was a ghost of the shiver that had seized me—seized us both—as Id moved against her, in the night. Beiched, the girls of the Bh call it. Did he fetch you—? They will tell you it es on you like a sneeze; but a sneeze is nothing to it, nothing at all—

    I shivered again, remembering. I put the tip of one fio my to tasted sharp—like vinegar, like blood.

    Like money.

    I grew afraid. Maud made some movement. I got up, not looking

    at her. I went to my room. I began to feel ill. Perhaps I had been drunk. Perhaps the beer I had had with my supper had been brewed bad. Perhaps I had a fever. I washed my hands and my face. The water was so cold it seemed to sting. I washed between my legs. Then I dressed. Then I waited. I heard Maud wake, and move; a slowly in to her. I saw her, through the space between her curtains. She had raised herself up from her pillow. She was trying to fasterings of her nightdress. I had uhem in the night.

    I saw that, and my insides shivered again. But when she lifted her eyes to mine, I looked away.

    I looked away! And she didnt call me to her side. She didnt speak. She watched me move about the room, but she said nothing. Margaret came, with coals and water: I stood pulling clothes from the press while she k at the hearth, my face blushing scarlet. Maud kept to her bed. Then Margaret left. I put out a goetticoats and shoes. I put out water.

    Will you e, I said, so I may dress you?

    She did. She stood, and slowly raised her arms, and I lifted up her gowhighs had a flush upohe curls of hair between her legs were dark. Upon her breast there was a crimson bruise, from where I had kissed too hard.

    I covered it up. She might have stopped me. She might have put her hands upon mine. She was the mistress, after all! But, she did nothing. I made her go with me to the silvery looking-glass above her fire, and she stood with her eyes cast down while I bed and pinned her hair. If she felt the trembling of my fingers against her face, she didnt say. Only when I had almost finished did she lift her head and catch my gaze. And then she blinked, and seemed to search for words. She said,

    What a thick sleep I had. Didnt I?

    You did, I said. My voice was shaking. No dreams.

    No dreams, she said, save one. But that was a sweet one. I think— I think you were in it, Sue

    She kept her eyes on mine, as if waiting. I saw the blood beat ihroat. Mio match it, my very heart turned in my

    breast; and I think, that if I had drawo me then, shed have kissed me. If I had said, 1 love you, she would have said it back; and everything would have ged. I might have saved her. I might have found a way—I dont know what—to keep her from her fate. We might have cheated Gentleman. I might have run with her, to Lant Street—

    But if I did that, shed fi for the villain I was. I thought of tellihe truth; and trembled harder. I couldnt do it. She was too simple. She was too good. If there had only been some stain upon her, some speck of badness in her heart—! But there was nothing. Only that crimson bruise. A single kiss had made it. How would she do, in the Bh?

    And then, how would / do, ba the Bh with her at my side?

    I heard, again, Johns laugh. I thought of Mrs Sucksby. Maud watched my face. I put the last pin to her hair, and then her  of velvet. I swallowed, and said,

    In your dream? I dont think so, miss. Not me. I should say— I should say, Mr Rivers. I stepped to the window. Look, there he is! His cigarette almost smoked already. You will miss him, if you wait!

    We were awkward with each other, all that day. We walked, but we walked apart. She reached to take my arm, and I drew away. And when, that night, I had put her into her bed and stood letting down her curtains, I looked at the empty place beside her and said,

    The nights are grown so warm now, miss. Dont you think you will sleep better on your own . . .?

    I went bay narrow bed, with its sheets like pieces of pastry. I heard her turning, and sighing, all through the night; and I turned, and sighed, myself. I felt that thread that had e between us, tugging, tugging at my heart—so hard, it hurt me. A huimes I almost rose, almost went in to her; a huimes I thought, Go to her! Why are you waiting? Go back to her side! But every time, I thought of what would happen if I did. I khat I couldnt lie beside her, without wanting to touch her. I couldnt

    have felt her breath e upon my mouth, without wanting to kiss her. And I couldnt have kissed her, without wanting to save her.

    So, I did nothing. I did nothing the  night, too, and the night after that; and soon, there were no more nights: the time, that had always gone so slow, ran suddenly fast, the end of April came. And by then, it was too late to ge anything.

 Chapter Six

    Gentlema first. Mr Lilly and Maud stood at the door to

    see him leave, and I watched from her window. She shook his

    O hand and he made her a bow. Therap took him off, to the

    station at Marlow. He sat with folded arms, his hat put back, his

    face our way, his eyes now on hers, now on mine.

    There goes the Devil, I thought.

    He made no sort of sign. He did not o. He had gone over his plans with us and we had them by heart. He was to travel three miles by the train, then wait. We were to keep to Mauds parlour till midnight, then go. He was to meet us at the river when the clock struck the half.

    That day passed just like all the old ones. Maud went to her uncle, as she had used to do, and I went slowly about her rooms, looking over her things—only this time, of course, I was looking out for what we ought to take. We sat at lunch. We walked in the park, to the ice-house, the graves, and the river. It was the final time we

    would do it, yet things looked the same as they always had. It was us who had ged. We walked, not speaking. Now and then our skirts came together—and once, our hands—aarted apart, as if stung; but if, like me, she coloured, I dont know, for I didnt look at her. Ba her room she stood still, like a statue. Only now and then I heard her sigh. I sat at her table with her box full of brooches and rings and a saucer of vinegar, shining up the stones. I would rather do that, I thought, than nothing. Once she came to look. Then she moved away, wiping her eyes. She said the vinegar made them sting. It made miing, too.

    Then came the evening. She went to her dinner, and I went to mine. Downstairs i, everyone was gloomy.

    Dohe same, now Mr Rivers has gohey said.

    Mrs Cakebreads face was dark as thunder. When Margaret let a spoon drop, she hit her with a ladle and made her scream. And then, no sooner had we started our dihan Charles burst out g at the table, and had to run from the kit wiping snot from his .

    Heve took it very hard, said one of the parlourmaids. Had his heart set on going to London as Mr Riverss man.

    You get back here! called Mr Way, standing up, his powder flying. Boy ye, fellow like him, Id be ashamed!

    But Charles would not e baot for Mr Way nor anyone. He had been takileman his breakfasts, polishing his boots, brushing his fancy coats. Now he should be stuck sharpening knives and shining glasses in the quietest house in England.

    He sat oairs a, and hit his head against the banisters. Mr Way went and gave him a beating. We heard the slap of his belt against Charless backside, and yelps.

    That put rather a dampener on the meal. We ate it in silence, and when we had finished and Mr Way had e back, his face quite purple and his wig at a tilt, I did not go with him and Mrs Stiles to the pantry to take my pudding. I said I had a head-ache. I almost did. Mrs Stiles looked me over, then looked away.

    How poorly you keep, Miss Smith, she said. I should say you must have left your health in London.

    But it was nothing to me, what she thought. I should not see her—or Mr Way, or Margaret, or Mrs Cakebread—ever again.

    I said Good-night, a upstairs. Maud, of course, was still with her uncle. Until she came I did what lanned, and got together all the gowns and shoes and bits and pieces we had agreed ought to be taken. It was all of it hers. My brown stuff dress I left behind me. I hadnt worn it in more than a month. I put it at the bottom of my trunk. I left that, too. We could only take bags. Maud had found out two old things of her mothers. Their leather was damp, with a bloom of white. They were marked, in brass, with letters so bold even I could read them: an M and an L—for her mothers name, which was like hers.

    I lihem with paper, and packed them tight. Ihe heaviest one, which I would carry—I put the jewels Id shined. I ed them in lio save them from tumbling about and growing dull. I put in one of her gloves with them—a white kid glove, with buttons of pearl. She had worn it ond supposed it lost. I meant to keep it, to remind me of her.

    I thought my heart was breaking in two.

    Then she came up from her uncle. She came twisting her hands. Oh! she said. How my head aches! I thought he would keep me forever, tonight!

    I had guessed she would e like this; and had got her some wine from Mr Way, as a nerver. I made her sit and take a little, then I wet a handkerchief with it and rubbed at the hollows of her brow. The wine made the handkerchief pink as a rose, and her head, where I chafed it, grew crimson. Her face was cool under my hand. Her eyelids fluttered. When they lifted, I stepped from her.

    Thank you, she said quietly, her gaze very soft.

    She drank more of the wi was quality stuff. What she left, I finished, and it went through me like a flame.

    Now, I said, you must ge. She was dressed for her supper. I had set out her walking-gown. But we must leave off the cage.

    For there was no room for a oline. Without it, her short dress at last became a long one, and she seemed slehan ever. She

    had grown thin. I gave her stout boots to wear. Then I showed her the bags. She touched them, and shook her head.

    Youve done everything, she said. I should never have thought of it all. I should never have done any of it, without you.

    She held my gaze, looking grateful and sad. God knows how my face seemed. I turned away. The house was creaking, settling down as the maids went up. Then came the clock again, chiming half-past nine. She said,

    Three hours, until he es.

    She said it in the same slow, fling way that I had heard her say, ohree weeks.

    We put the lamp out in her parlour, and stood at her window. We could not see the river, but we gazed at the wall of the park and thought of the water lying beyond it, cool and ready, waiting like us. We stood for an hour, saying almost nothing. Sometimes she shivered. Are you cold? Id say then. But she was not cold. At last the waiting began to tell even on me, and I began to fidget. I thought I might not have packed her bags as I should have. I thought I might have left out her linen, or her jewels, or that white glove. I had put the glove in, I k; but I was bee like her, restless as a flea. I went to her bedroom and opehe bags, leavi the window. I took out all the gowns and linen, and packed them again. Then, as I tightened a strap on a buckle, it broke. The leather was so old it was almost perished. I got a needle, and sewed the strap tight, i, wild stitches. I put my mouth to the thread to bite it, and tasted salt.

    Then I heard the opening of Mauds door.

    My heart gave a jump. I put the bags out of sight, in the shadow of the bed, and stood and listened. No sound at all. I went to the door to the parlour, and looked ihe window-curtains were open ahe moonlight in; but the room was empty, Maud was gone.

    She had left the door ajar. I tiptoed to it and squinted into the passage. I thought there came another hen, above the ordinary creakings and tigs of the house—perhaps, the opening

    and shutting of another door, far-off. But I couldnt be sure. I called once, in a whisper, Miss Maud!—but even a whisper sounded loud, at Briar, and I fell silent, straining my ears, looking hard at the darkness, then walking a few steps into the passage and listening again. I put my hands together and pressed them tight, more nervous now than I  say; but I was also, to be ho, rather peeved—for wasnt it like her, to go wandering off at this late hour, without a reason or a word?

    When the clock struck half-past eleven I called again, and took another couple of steps along the passage. But then my foot caught the edge of a rug, and I almost tripped. She could go this way without a dle, she k so well; but it was all strao me. I didnt dare wander after her. Suppose I took a wrong turning in the dark? I might never make my way out again.

    So I only waited, ting the minutes. I went back to the bedroom and brought out the bags. Then I stood at the window. The moon was full, the night was bright. The lawn lay stretched before the house, the wall at the end of it, the river beyond. Somewhere oer was Gentleman, ing closer as I watched. How long would he wait?

    At last, when I had sweated myself into a lather, the clock struck twelve. I stood and trembled at each beating of the bell. The last one sounded, a an echo. I thought, Thats it.—And, as I thought it, I heard the soft thud of her boots—she was at the door, her face pale in the darkness, her breaths ing quick as a cats.

    Five me, Sue! she said. I went to my uncles library. I wao see it, a final time. But I couldnt go until I knew he was asleep.

    She shivered. I pictured her, pale and slight and silent, alone among those dark books. Never mind, I said. But, we must be quick. e here, e on.

    I gave her her cloak, and fastened up mine. She looked about her, at all she was leaving. Her teeth began to chatter. I gave her the lightest bag. Then I stood before her and put a fio her mouth.

    Now, be steady, I said.

    All my nervousness had left me, and I was suddenly calm. I thought of my mother, and all the dark and sle..eping houses she

    must have stolen her way through, before they caught her. The bad blood rose in me, just like wine.

    We went by the servants stairs. I had been carefully up and dowhe day before, looking for the steps that particularly creaked; now I led her over them, holding her hand, and watg where she placed her feet. At the start of the corridor where there were the doors to the kit and to Mrs Stiless pantry, I made her stop and wait and listen. She kept her hand in mine. A mouse ran, quick, along the wainscot; but there was no other movement, and no sounds from anywhere. The floor had drugget on it, that softened our shoes. Only our skirts went rustle and swish.

    The door to the yard was locked with a key, but the key was left in it: I drew it out before I tur, and put a little beef fat to the bit; and then I put more fat to the bolts that fastehe door closed at the bottom and the top. I had got the fat from Mrs Cakebreads cupboard. That was sixpence less she should have from the butchers boy! Maud watched me laying it about the locks, with an astounded sort of look. I said softly,

    This is easy. If we was ing the other way, that would be hard.

    Then I gave her a wink. It was the satisfa of the job. I really wished, just then, it had been harder. I licked my fingers  of the fat, then put my shoulder to the door and pressed it tight into its frame: after that, the key turned smoothly and the bolts slid in their cradles, gentle as babies.

    The air, outside, was cold and clear. The moon cast great black shadoere grateful for them. We kept to the walls of the house that were darkest, going quickly and softly from oo another and then running fast across a er of lawn to the hedges and trees beyond. She held my hand again, and I showed her where to run. Only once I felt her hesitate, and then I turned and found her gazing at the house, with a queer expression that seemed half-fearful a was almost a smile. There were no lights in the windows. No-oched. The house looked flat, like a house in a play. I let her stand for almost a mihen pulled her hand.

    Now you must e, I said.

    She turned her head and did not look again. We walked quickly to the wall of the park, and then we followed it, along a damp and tangled path. The bushes caught at the wool of our cloaks, and creatures leapt in the grass, or slithered before us; and there were cobwebs, fine and shining like wires of glass, that we must trample through and break. The noise seemed awful. Our breaths came harder. We walked so long, I thought we had missed the gate to the river; but theh grew clearer, and the arch sprang up, lit bright by the moon. Maud moved past me and took out her key, a us through it, then made the gate fast at our backs.

    Noere out of the park I breathed a little freer. We set down the bags and stood still in the darkness, in the shadow of the wall. The moon struck the rushes of the further bank, and made spears of them, with wicked points. The surface of the river seemed almost white. The only sound now was the flowing of the water, the calling of some bird; then came the splash of a fish. There was no sign of Gentleman. We had e quicker than we planned for. I listened, and heard nothing. I looked at the sky, at all the stars that were in it. More stars than seemed natural. Then I looked at Maud. She was holding her cloak about her face, but when she saw me turn to her she reached and took my hand. She took it, not to be led by me, not to be forted; only to hold it, because it was mine.

    In the sky, a star moved, ah turo watch it.

    Thats luck, I said.

    Then the Briar bell struck. Half-past twelve—the chime came clear across the park, I suppose the bright air made it sharper. For a sed, the echo of it hung about the ear; and then above it rose anentler sound—we heard it, and stepped apart—it was the careful creak of oars, the slither of water against wood. About the bend of the silvery river came the dark shape of a boat. I saw the oars dip and rise, and scatter s of moonlight; then they were drawn high, a a silehe boat glided towards the rushes, then rocked and creaked again as Gentleman half-rose from his seat. He could not see us, where we waited in the shadow of the wall. He could not see us; but it was not me who stepped forward

    first, it was her. She went stiffly to the waters edge, then took the coil of rope he threw and braced herself against the tugging of the boat, until the boat was steady.

    I dont remember if Gentleman spoke. I dont believe he looked at me, except, once he had helped Maud across the a landing-place, to give me his hand and guide me as he had guided her, over the rotten planks. I think we did it all in silence. I know the boat was narrow, and our skirts bulged as we sat—for, wheleman took up the oars to turn us, we rocked again, and I grew suddenly frightened of the boat capsizing, imagining the water filling all those folds and frills and sug us under. But Maud sat steady. I saw Gentleman looking her over. Still no-one spoke, however. We had do all in a moment, and the boat moved quick. The stream was with us. For a mihe river followed the wall of the park; we passed the place where I had seen him kiss her hand; then the wall snaked off. There came a line of dark trees instead. Maud sat with her eyes on her lap, not looking.

    We went very carefully. The night was so still. Gentlemahe boat as close as he could to the shadows of the bank: only now and then, wherees were thinner, did we move in moonlight. But there was no-one about, to watch us. Where there were houses built o the river, they were shut up and dark. Once, when the river became broad, and there were islands, with barges moored at them, and grazing horses, he stopped the oars a us glide in silence; but still no-one heard us pass or came to look. Then the river grew narrow again, and we moved on; and after that, there were no more houses and no more boats. There was only the darkness, the broken moonlight, the creaking of the sculls, the dipping and the rising of Gentlemans hands and the white of his cheek above his whisker.

    We did not keep upon the river for long. At a spot upon the bank, two miles from Briar, he pulled up the boat and moored it. This was where he had started from. He had left a horse there, with a ladys saddle on it. He helped us from the water, sat Maud upon the horses back, and strapped her bags beside her. He said,

    We must go another mile or so. Maud? She did not answer. You must be brave. We are very close now.

    Then he looked at me and nodded. We started off—him leading the horse by the bridle, Maud hunched and stiff upon it, me walking behind. Still we met no-one. Again I looked at the stars. You never saw stars sht at home, the sky was never so dark and so clear.

    The horse was shoeless. Its hooves sounded dull on the dirt of the road.

    We went rather slowly—for Mauds sake, I suppose, so she should not be shaken about and made sick. She looked sick, anyway; and when we came at last to the place he had found—it was two or three leaning cottages, and a great dark church—she looked sicker than ever. A dog came up and started barking. Gentleman kicked it and made it yelp. He led us to the cottage that was he church, and the door ened, a man came out, and then a woman, holding a lantern. They had been waiting. The woman was the one who had kept the rooms for us: she was yawning, but stretg her neck as she yawo get a good look at Maud. She made Gentleman a curtsey. The man was the parson, the vicar— whatever you call him. He made a bow. He wore a gown of dirty white, and wanted shaving. He said,

    Good-night to you. Good-night to you, miss. And what a fair night, for an escapade!

    Gentleman said only, Is everything made ready? He put his arms up to Maud,<bdi></bdi> to help her from the horse: she kept her hands upon the saddle, and slid doardly, and stepped away from him. She did not e to me, but stood alohe woman still studied her. She was studying her pale, set, handsome face, her look of siess, and I knew she was thinking—as anyone would think, I suppose—that she was in the family way, and marrying out of fear. Perhaps Gentleman had even made her think it, when he spoke to her before. For it would be all to his advantage, if it came to a challenge by Mr Lilly, for it to seem that he had had Maud in her uncles own house; and we could say the baby got miscarried, later.

    I would say it, I thought, for five hundred more.

    I thought that, even as I stood watg the woman looking at

    Maud and hating her for doing it; even as I hated myself, for thinking it. The parson came forward and made another bow.

    Alls ready indeed, sir, he said. Theres only the little matter of— In light of the special circumstances—

    Yes, yes, said Gentlemaook the parson aside and drew out his pocket-book. The horse tossed its head, but from one of the other cottages a boy had e over to lead it away. He also looked at Maud; but then he looked from her to me, and it was me he touched his cap to. Of course, he had not seen her in the saddle, and I was dressed in one of her old gowns and must have seemed quite a lady; and she stood in such a mean and shrinking kind of way, that she seemed the maid.

    She did not see it. She had her eyes upon the ground. The parson put his money away in some close pocket under his robe, then he rubbed his hands together. Well and good, he said. And should the lady like to ge her e? Should she like to visit her room? Or shall we do the joining at once?

    Well do it at once, said Gentleman, before anyone else could answer. He took off his hat and smoothed his hair, fussing a little with the curls about his ears. Maud stood very stiff. I went to her, and put her hood up nicely, aled the cloak ier folds; and then I passed my hands across her hair and cheeks. She would not look at me. Her face was cold. The hem of her skirt was dark, as if dipped in a dye for m. Her cloak had mud on it. I said, Give me your mittens, miss.—For I khat, beh them, she had her white kid gloves. I said, You had much better go to your wedding in white gloves, than buff mittens.

    She let me draw them from her, theood and crossed her hands. The woman said to me, No flower, for the lady? I looked at Gentleman. He shrugged.

    Should you like a flower, Maud? he said carelessly. She didnt answer. He said, Well, I think we shall not mind the absence of a flower. Now, sir, if you will—

    I said, You might at least get her a flower! Just one flower, for her to carry into church!

    I had not thought of it until the woman said it; but now—oh! the

    cruelty of taking her, without a bloom, to be his wife, seemed all at once a frightful thing, I could not bear it. My voice came out sounding almost wild, aleman gazed at me and frowned, and the parson looked curious, the woman sorry; and then Maud turned her eyes to me and said slowly,

    I should like a flower, Richard. I should like a flower. And Sue must have a flower, too.

    With every saying of the one word, flower, it seemed to grow a little stranger. Gentlema out his breath and began to look about him in a peevish sort of way. The parson also looked. It was half-past one or so, and very dark out of the moonlight. We stood in a muddy kind of green, with hedges of brambles. The hedges were black. If there were flowers in there, we should never have found them. I said to the woman,

    Havent you nothing we might take? Havent you a flower in a pot? She thought a mihen stepped nimbly bato her cottage; and what she came out with at last was, a sprig of dry leaves, round as shillings, white as paper, quivering on a few thin stalks that looked ready to snap.

    It was hoy. We stood and gazed at it, and no-one would . Then Maud took the stalks and divided them up, giving some to me, but keeping the most for herself. In her hands the leaves quivered harder than ever. Gentleman lit up a cigarette and took two puffs of it, then threw it away. It stayed glowing in the darkness. He o the parson, and the parson took up the lantern, and led us through the church gate and along a path between a line of tilting gravestohat the moon gave deep, sharp shadows. Maud walked with Gentleman, and he held her arm in his. I walked with the woman. We were to be witnesses. Her name was Mrs Cream.

    e far? she said.

    I did not answer.

    The church was of flint and, even with the moon on it, looked quite black. I was whitewashed, but the white had turo yellow. There were a few dles lit, about the altar and the pews, and a few moths about the dles, some dead in the wax. We did not try to sit, but went straight to the altar, and the parson stood

    before us with his Bible. He bli the page. He read, and muddled his words. Mrs Cream breathed hard, like a horse. I stood and held my poor, bent twig of hoy, and watched Maud standing at Gentlemans side, holding tight on to hers. I had kissed her. I had lain upon her. I had touched her with a sliding hand. I had called her a pearl. She had been kio me than anyone save Mrs Sucksby; and she had made me love her, when I meant only to ruin her.

    She was about to be married, and was frighteo death. And soon no-one would love her, ever again.

    I saw Gentleman look at her. The parson coughed over his book. He had got to the part of the service that asked if anybody there knew any reason as to why the man and woman before him should not be married; and he looked up through his eyebrows, and for a sed the church was still.

    I held my breath, and said nothing.

    So then he went on, looking at Maud and at Gentleman, asking the same thing of them, saying that, on the Day of Judgement they should have to give up all the awful secrets of their hearts; and had much better give them up now, and be doh it.

    Again there was a silence.

    So theuro Gentleman. Will you, he said, and all the rest of it—Will you have her and honour her, for as long as you live?

    I will, said Gentleman.

    The parson hen he faced Maud, and asked the same thing of her; and she hesitated, then spoke.

    I will, she said.

    Theleman stood a little easier. The parson stretched his throat from his collar and scratched it.

    Who gives this woman to be married? he said.

    I kept quite still, till Gentleman turo me; and then he gestured with his head, and I went and stood at Mauds side, and they showed me how I must take her hand and pass it to the parson, for him to put it into Gentlemans. I would rather Mrs Cream had do, than almost anything. Her fingers, without

    her glove, were stiff and cold as fingers made of wax. Gentlemahem, and spoke the words the parsoo him; and then Maud took his hand, and said the same words over. Her voice was so thin, it seemed to rise like smoke into the darkness, and then to vanish.

    Theleman brought a ring out, aook her hand again and put the ring over her finger, all the time repeating the parsons words, that he would worship her, and give her all his goods. The ring looked queer upon her. It seemed gold in the dle-light, but—I saw it later—it was bad.

    It was all bad, and couldnt have been worse. The parson read another prayer, then raised his hands and closed his eyes.

    These two that God has joiogether, he said, let no man put in sunder.

    And that was it.

    They were married.

    Gentleman kissed her and she stood and swayed, as if dazed. Mrs Cream said in a murmur,

    She dont know whatve hit her, look at her. Shell know it later— plum feller like him. Heh heh.

    I did not turn to her. If I had, I should have punched her. The parson shut his Bible and led us from the altar to the room where they kept the register. Here Gentleman wrote his name and Maud— who was now to be Mrs Rivers—wrote hers; and Mrs Cream and I put ours beh them. Gentleman had already shown me how to write Smith; but still, I wrote it clumsily and was ashamed.— Ashamed, of that! The room was dark and smelled of damp. In the beams, things fluttered—perhaps birds, perhaps bats. I saw Maud gazing at the shadows, as if afraid the things should swoop.

    Gentleman took her arm and held it, and then he led her from the church. There had e clouds before the moon, and the night was darker. The parson shook hands with us, then made Maud a bow; then he went off. He went fast, and as he walked he took his robe off, and his clothes were black beh it—he seemed to snuff himself out like a light. Mrs Cream took us to her

    cottage. She carried the lantern, and we walked behind her, stumbling on her path: her doorway was low, and knocked Gentlemans hat off. She took us up a set of tilting stairs too narrow for our skirts, and then to a landing, about as big as a cupboard, where we all jostled about for a moment and the cuff of Mauds cloak got laid upon the ey of the lantern and was singed.

    There were two shut doors there, leading to the two little bedrooms of the house. The first had a narrow straw mattress on a pallet on the floor, and was for me. The sed had a bigger bed, an arm-chair and a press, and was fentleman and Maud. She went into it, and stood with her eyes on the floor, looking at nothing. There was a single dle lit. Her bags lay beside the bed. I went to them and took her things out, one by one, and put them in the press. Mrs Cream said, What handsome linen!—-She was watg from the dentleman stood with her, looking stra was him that had taught me the handling of a petticoat but now, seeiake out Mauds shimmies and stogs, he seemed almost afraid. He said,

    Well, I shall smoke a final cigarette downstairs. Sue, youll make things fortable up here?

    I did not answer. He and Mrs Cream went down, their boots sounding loud as thunder and the door and the boards and the crooked staircase trembling. I heard him outside then, striking a match.

    I looked at Maud. She was still holding the stalks of hoy. She took a step towards me and said quickly,

    If I should call out to you later, will you e?

    I took the flowers from her, and then the cloak. I said, Dont think of it; It will be<s></s> over in a minute.

    She caught hold of my wrist with her right hand, that still had the glove upon it. She said, Listen to me, I mean it. Never mind what he does. If I call out to you, say youll e. Ill give you money for it.

    Her voice was strange. Her fingers shook, yet gripped me hard. The thought of her giving me so much as a farthing was awful. I said,

    Where are your drops? Look, theres water here, you might take your drops and they will make you sleep.

    Sleep? she said. She laughed and caught her breath. Do you think I want to sleep, on my wedding-night?

    She pushed my hand away. I stood at her bad began to undress her. When I had taken her gown and her corset I turned and said, quietly,

    You had better use the pot. You had better wash ys, before he es.

    I think she shuddered. I did not watch her, but heard the splash of water. Then I bed her hair. There was no glass for her to stand at, and whe into the bed she looked to her side and there was no table, no box, no portrait, no light—I saw her put out her hand as if blind.

    Then the house-door closed, and she fell bad seized the blas and pulled them high about her breast. Against the white of the pillow her face seemed dark; yet I khat it ale. We heard Gentleman and Mrs Cream, talking together in the room below. Their voices came clearly. There were gaps between the boards, and a faint light showed.

    I looked at Maud. She met my gaze. Her eyes were black, but gleamed like glass. Will you look away, still? she said, in a whisper, when she saw me turn my head. Then I turned back. I could not help it, though her face was awful, it was terrible to see. Gentleman talked on. Some breeze got into the room and made the dle-flame dip. I shivered. Still she held my gaze with hers. Then she spoke again.

    e here, she said.

    I shook my head. She said it again. I shook my head again—but theo her, anyway—went softly to her across the creaking boards, and she lifted her arms and drew my face to hers, and kissed me. She kissed me, with her sweet mouth, made salt with her tears; and I could not help but kiss her back—felt my heart, now like i my breast, and now like water, running, from the heat of her lips.

    But then she did this. She kept her fingers upon my head and pushed my mouth toainst hers; and she seized my hand

    and took it, first to her bosom, then to where the blas dipped, between her legs. There she rubbed with my fingers until they burned.

    The quick, sweet feeling her kiss had called up iuro something like horror, or fear. I pulled from her, and drew my hand away. Wont you do it? she said softly, reag after me. Didnt you do it before, for the sake of this night? t you leave me to him now, with your kisses on my mouth, your touch upohere, to help me bear his the better?—Dont go! She seized me again. You went, before. You said I dreamed you. Im not dreaming now. I wish I were! God knows, God knows, I wish I were dreaming, and might wake up a Briar again!

    Her fingers slipped from my arm and she fell bad sagged against her pillow; and I stood, clasping and unclasping my hands, afraid of her look, of her words, of her rising voice; afraid she might shriek, or swoon—afraid, God damhat she might cry out, loud enough fentleman or Mrs Cream to hear, that I had kissed her.

    Hush! Hush! I said. You are married to him now. You must be different. You are a wife. You must—

    I fell silent. She lifted her head. Below, the light had been taken up and moved. Gentlemans boots came loud again upon the narrow stairs. I heard him slow his step, theate at the door. Perhaps he was w if he should knock, as he had used to knock at Briar. At last he slowly put his thumb to the latch, and came in.

    Are you ready? he said.

    He brought the chill of the night in with him. I did not say another word, to him or to her. I did not look at her face. I went to my own room and lay upon my bed. I lay, in the darkness, in my cloak and my gown, my head between the pillow and the mattress; and all I heard, each time I woke in the night, was the creeping, creeping of little creatures through the straw beh my cheek.

    In the m, Gentleman came to my room. He came in his shirtsleeves.

    She wants you, to dress her, he said.

    He took his breakfast downstairs. Maud had been brought up a tray, with a plate upon it. The plate held eggs and a kidney; she had not touched them. She sat very still, in the arm-chair beside the window; and I saw at once how it would be with her, now. Her face was smooth, but dark about the eyes. Her hands were bare. The yell glittered. She looked at me, as she looked at everything—the plate of eggs, the view beyond the window, the gown I held up to place over her head—with a soft, odd, distant kind of gaze; and when I spoke to her, to ask her some trifling thing, she listened, and waited, then answered and blinked, as if the question, and the answer—even the movement of her own throat making the words—were all perfectly surprising and strange.

    I dressed her, and she sat again beside the window. She kept her hands bent at the wrist, the fingers slightly lifted, as if even to let them rest against the soft stuff of her wide skirt might be to hurt them.

    She held her head at a tilt. I thought she might be listening for the chiming of the house-bell at Briar. But she never mentioned her uncle, or her old life, at all.

    I took her pot aied it, in the privy behind the house. At the foot of the stairs Mrs Cream came to me. She had a sheet over her arm. She said,

    Mr Rivers says the linen on the bed needs ging.

    She looked as if she would like to wink. I would not gaze at her long enough to let her. I had fotten about this part. I went slowly up the stairs and she came behind me, breathing harder than ever. She made Maud a kind of curtsey, theo the bed and drew back the blas. There were a few spots of dark blood there, that had been rolled upon and smeared. She stood and looked at them, and then she caught my eye—as much as to say, Well, I shouldnt have believed it. Quite a little love-match, after all! Maud sat gazing out of the window. From the room downstairs came the squeak of Gentlemans knife on his plate. Mrs Cream raised the sheet, to see if the blood had marked the mattress underh; it hadnt, and that pleased her.

    I helped her ge it, then saw her to the door. She had made another curtsey, and seen Mauds queer, soft gaze.

    Took it hard, have she? she whispered. Maybe missing her ma?

    I said nothing at first. Then I remembered our plot, and what was to happeer, I thought drearily, to make it happen soon. I stood otle landing with her and closed the door. I said quietly,

    Hard aint the word for it. Theres trouble, up here. Mr Rivers dotes on her and wont bear gossip—he has brought her to this quiet place, hoping the try air will calm her.

    Calm her? she said then. You mean—? Bless me! She aint likely to break out—turn the pigs loose—set the place afire?

    No, no, I said. She is only—only too mu her head.

    Poor lady, said Mrs Cream. But I could see her thinking. She hadnt bargained on having a mad girl in the house. And whenever she brought a tray up then, she looked sideways at Maud a down very quick, as if afraid she might get bitten.

    She doesnt like me, said Maud, after she saw her do that two or three times; and I swallowed and said, Not like you? What an idea! Why should she not like you?

    I t say, she answered quietly, looking down at her hands.

    Later Gentleman heard her say it, too; and the me on my own. Thats good, he said. Keep Mrs Cream in fear of her, and her in fear of Mrs Cream, while seeming not tood. That will help us, when it es time to call in the doctor.

    He gave it a week before he sent for him. I thought it the worst week of my life. He had told Maud they should stay a day; but on the se he looked at her and said,

    How pale you are, Maud! I think you arent quite well. I think we ought to stay a little longer, until your strength es back to you.

    Stay longer? she said. Her voice was dull. But t we go, to your house in London?

    I really think you are not well enough.

    Not well? But, I am quite well—you must only ask Sue. Sue, wont you tell Mr Rivers how well I am?

    She sat and shook. I said nothing. Just a day or two more, said Gentleman. Until you are rested. Until you are calm. Perhaps, if you were to keep more to the bed—?

    She began to weep. He went to her side, and that made her shudder and weep harder. He said, Oh, Maud, it tears at my heart to see you like this! If I thought it would be a fort to you, of course I should take you to London at once—I should carry you, in my own arms—do you think I would not? But do you look at yourself now, and still tell me you are well?

    I dont know, she said then. It is se here. Im afraid, Richard—

    And wont it be stranger, in London? And shouldnt you be frightehere, where its so loud and crowded and dark? Oh, no, this is the place to keep you. Here you have Mrs Cream, to make you fortable—

    Mrs Cream hates me.

    Hates you? Oh, Maud. Now yrowing foolish; and I should be sorry to think you that; and Sue should also be sorry— shouldnt you, Sue? I would not answer. Of course she would, he said, with his hard blue eyes on mine. Maud looked at me, too, then looked away. Gentleman took her head in his hands and kissed her brow.

    There now, he said. Let us have no more argument. Well stay another day—only a day, until that paleness is driven from your cheek, and your eyes are bright again!

    He said the same thing then, the  day. On the fourth day he was stern with her—said she seemed to mean to disappoint him, to make him wait, when he longed only to carry her back to Chelsea as his bride; then on the fifth day, he took her in his arms and almost wept, and said he loved her.

    After that, she did not ask how long they were to stay there. Her cbbr></abbr>heek never grew rosy. Her eye stayed dull. Gentleman told Mrs Cream to make her every kind of nourishing dish, and what she

    brought were mgs, more kidneys, livers, greasy bas and puddings of blood. The meat made the room smell sour. Maud could eat none of it. I ate it instead—sinebody must. I ate it, and she only sat beside the window gazing out, turning the ring upon her finger, stretg her hands, or drawing a strand of hair across her mouth.

    Her hair was dull as her eyes. She would not let me wash it—she would hardly let me brush it, she said she couldhe scraping of the b upon her head. She kept in the gown she had travelled from Briar in, that had mud about the hem. Her best gown—a silk one—she gave to me. She said,

    Why should I wear it, here? I had much rather see you in it. You had much better wear it, tha lie in the press.

    Our fiouched beh the silk, and we flinched and stepped apart. She had ried to kiss me, after that first night.

    I took the dress. It helped to pass the awful hours, sittiing out the waist; and she seemed to like to watch me sew it. When I had fi, and put it on and stood before her, her expression was strange. How well you look! she said, her blood rising. The colour sets off your eyes and hair. I k would. Now you are quite the beauty—arent you? And I am plain—dont you think?

    I had got her a little looking-glass from Mrs Cream. She caught it up irembling hand and came and held it before our faces. I remembered the time she had dressed me up, in her old room, and called us sisters; and how gay she had seemed then, and how plump and careless. She had liked to stand before her glass and make herself look fair, fentleman. Now—I saw it! I saw it, in the desperate slyness of her gaze!—now she was glad to see herself grown plain. She thought it meant he would not want her.

    I could have told her ohat he would want her anyway.

    Now, I dont know what he did with her. I never spoke to him more than I had to. I did everything that was needed, but I did it all in a thick, miserable kind of trance, shrinking from thought and feeling—I was as low, almost, as she was. Aleman, to do him justice, seemed troubled on his own at. He only came to

    kiss or bully her, a little while each day; the rest of the time he sat in Mrs Creams parlour, lighting cigarettes—the smoke came rising through the floor, to mix with the smell of the meat, the chamberpot, the sheets on the bed. Once or twice he went riding. He went for news of Mr Lilly—but heard only that the word was, there was some queer stir at Briar, no-one knew quite what. In the evenings he would stand at a fe the back of the house, looking over the black-faced pigs; or he would walk a little, in the lane or about the churchyard. He would walk, however, as if he kneatched him—not in the old, show-off way he had used to stretd smoke his cigarettes, but with a twitch to his step, as if he could not bear the feel of azes on his back.

    Then at night I would undress her, and he would e, and I would leave them, and lie alone, with my head between my pillow and my rustling mattress.

    I should have said he o do it to her only the once. I should have thought he might have been frightened he should get her with child. But there were other things I thought he might like her to do, now he had learned how smooth her hands were, how soft her bosom was, how warm and glib her mouth.

    And every m, when I went in to her, she seemed paler and thinner and in more of a daze than she had seemed the night before; and he caught my eye less, and plucked at his whiskers, his swagger all gone.

    He at least knew what a dreadful business he was about, the bloody villain.

    At last he sent for the doctor to e.

    I heard him writing the letter in Mrs Creams parlour. The doctor was one he knew. I believe he had been crooked once, perhaps in the ladies medie line, and had taken to the madhouse business as being more safe. But the crookedness, for us, was only a security. He wasnt in olemans plot. Gentleman wouldnt have cared to cut the cash with him.

    Besides, the story was too sound. And there was Mrs Cream to back it. Maud was young, she was fey, and had bee from the

    world. She had seemed to love Gentleman, and he loved her; but they hadnt been married an hour before she started to turn queer.

    I think any doctor would have done what that one did, hearilemans story, and seeing Maud, and me, as we were then.

    He came with another man—another doctor, his assistant. You wo doctors words to put a lady away. Their house was near Reading. Their coach was odd-looking, with blinds like louvred shutters and, on its back, spikes. They came not to take Maud, though—not that time; only to study her. The taking came later.

    Gentleman told her they were two of his painter friends. She seemed not to care. She let me wash her and make her dull hair a little er, and tidy her gown; but then she kept to her chair, saying nothing. Only when she saw their coach pull up did she stare, and begin to breathe a little quicker—and I wondered if she had noticed the blinds and the spikes, as I had. The dot dowlema quickly out to talk with them, and they shook hands and put their heads together, and looked slyly up at our window.

    Theleman came back, ahem waiting. He came upstairs. He was rubbing his hands together and smiling. He said,

    Well, what do you think! Here are my friends Graves and Christie, e down to visit from London. You remember, Maud, I spoke to you of them? I dont believe they thought me really married! They have e to see the phenomenon for themselves.

    Still he smiled. Maud would not look at him.

    Shall you mind it, dear, he said, if I bring them to you? I have left them now with Mrs Cream.

    I could hear them, then, in the parlour, talking in low, serious voices. I knew what questions they were asking, and what answers Mrs Cream would make. Gentleman waited for Maud to speak and, when she said nothing, looked at me. He said,

    Sue, will you e with me a moment?

    He made a gesture with his eyes. Maud gazed after us, blinking. I went with him to the crooked landing, and he closed the door at my back.

    I think you should leave her with me, he said quietly, when they

    go to her. I shall watch her, then; perhaps make her nervous. It keeps her too calm, having you always about her.

    I said, Dohem hurt her.

    Hurt her? He almost laughed. These men are sdrels. They like to keep their lunatics safe. Theyd have them in fire-proof vaults if they could, like bullion; and so live off the ihey wont hurt her. But they know their business, too, and a sdal would ruin them. My word is good, but they shall o look at her and talk to her; and they shall also o talk to you. Youll know how to answer, of course.

    I made a face. Will I? I said.

    He narrowed his eyes. Dont make game of me, Sue. Not now we are so close. Youll know what to say?

    I shrugged, still sulky. I think so.

    Good girl. I shall bring them first to you.

    He made to put his hand upon me. I dodged it and stepped away. I went to my little room, and waited. The doctors came after a moment. Gentleman came with them, then closed the door and stood before it, his eyes on my face.

    They were tall men, like him, and one of them was stout. They were dressed in black jackets aic boots. When they moved, the floor, the walls and the window gave a shudder. Only one of them—the thinner one—spoke; the other just watched. They made me a bow, and I curtseyed.

    Ah, said the speaking doctor quietly, when I did that. His name was Dr Christie. Now, you knoe are, I think? You wont mind, if we ask you what might seem imperti questions? We are friends of Mr Riverss, and very curious to hear about his marriage, and his new wife.

    Yes, I said. You mean, my mistress.

    Ah, he said again. Your mistress. Now, refresh my memory. Who is she?

    Mrs Rivers, I said. That was Miss Lilly.

    Mrs Rivers, that was Miss Lilly. Ah.

    He he silent doctraves—took out a pencil and a book. The first o on:

    Your mistress. And you are—?

    Her maid, sir.

    Of course. And what is your name?

    Dr Graves held his pencil, ready to write. Gentleman caught my eye, and nodded. Susan Smith, sir, I said.

    Dr Christie looked at me harder. You seemed to hesitate, he said. That is your name, you are quite sure?

    I should say I know my own name! I said.

    Of course.

    He smiled. My heart still beat hard. Perhaps he saw it. He seemed to grow kind. He said,

    Well, Miss Smith,  you tell us now, how long you have known your mistress . . .?

    It was like the time, at Lant Street, when I had stood befentleman and he had put me through my character. I told them about Lady Aliayfair, alemans old nurse, and my dead mother; and then about Maud. I said she had seemed to like Mr Rivers but now, a week after her wedding-night, she was grown very sad and careless of herself, and made me afraid.

    Dr Graves wrote it all down. Dr Christie said,

    Afraid. Do you mean, for your own sake?

    I said, Not for mine, sir. For hers. I think she might harm herself, she is so miserable.

    I see, he said. Then: You are fond of your mistress. You have spoken very kindly of her. Now, will you tell me this. What care do you think your mistress ought to have, that would make her better?

    I said, I think—

    Yes?

    I wish—

    He nodded. Go on.

    I wish you would keep her, sir, and watch her, I said in a rush. I wish you would keep her some place where no-one could touch her, or hurt her—

    My heart seemed all at once high in my throat, and my voice oiled with tears. Gentleman still had his eyes upohe

    doctor took my hand and held it, close about the wrist, in a familiar way.

    There, there, he said. You must not be so distressed. Your mistress shall have everything you wish for her. She has been lucky, io have had so good and faithful a servant, as you!

    He patted and smoothed my hand, the go. He looked at his watch. He caught Gentlemans eye, and nodded. Very good, he said. Very good. Now, if you might just show us—?

    Of course, said Gentleman quickly. Of course. This way He opehe door, and they turheir black backs to me and all moved off. I watched them do it, and was gripped suddenly by a feeling—I could not say if it was misery, or fear. I took a step and called out after them.

    She dont like eggs, sir! I called. Dr Christie half turned. I had lifted my hand. Now I let it fall. She dont like eggs, I said more feebly, in any kind of dish.

    It was all I could think of. He smiled, and bowed; but in a hum kind of way. Dr Graves wrote—or preteo write— in his book, Dont care fs. Gentlemahem both across to Mauds room. Then he came bae.

    Youll keep here, until theyve seen her? he said.

    I did not answer. He shut my door. But those walls were like paper: I heard them move about, caught the rumble of the doctors questions; then, after a minute or so, came the thin rising and falling of her tears.

    They did not stay with her long. I suppose they had all they needed, from me and Mrs Cream. When they had gone I went to her, aleman was standing behind her chair, holding her pale head between his hands. He had been leaning to gaze at her, perhaps to whisper and tease. When he saw me e he straightened and said,

    Look, Sue, at your mistress. Dont you think her eyes a little brighter?

    They were bright, with the last of her tears still in them; and they were red at the rims.

    Are you well, miss? I said.

    She is well, said Gentleman. I think the pany of friends has cheered her. I think those dear good fellows, Christie and Graves, were quite delighted with her; and you tell me, Sue, when did a lady ever not begin to flourish, under a gentlemans delight?

    She turned her head and raised her hand, and plucked a little weakly at his pressing fingers. He stood holding her face a moment lohen stepped away.

    What a fool Ive been, he said to me. Ive asked Mrs Rivers to grow strong, in this quiet place, thinking the quietness would help her. Now I see that what she needs is the bustle of the city. Graves and Christie saw it, too. They are so eager to have us joi Chelsea—why, Christie is giving us the use of his own coad driver! We are to leave tomorrow. Maud, what do you say to that?

    She had turned her gaze to the window. Now she lifted her head to him, and a little blood struggled into her white cheeks.

    Tomorrow? she said. So soon as that?

    He omorrow well go. To a great house, with fine, quiet rooms, and good servants in it, that waits there just for you.

    day she put her breakfast of eggs a aside, as usual; but even I could  it. I dressed her without looking at her. I knew every part of her. She wore the old gown still, that was stained with mud, and I wore the handsome silk one. She would not let me ge out of it, even for travelling, though I k would crease.

    I thought of wearing it ba the Bh. I could not believe that I would be at home again, with Mrs Sucksby, before it was dark.

    I packed her bags. I did it slowly, hardly feeling the things I touched. Into one bag went her linen, her slippers, her sleeping-drops, a bo, a brush—that was for her to take to the madhouse. Into the other went everything else. That was for me. Only that white glove I think I have mentioned, did I keep to one side; and when the bags were filled I put it, ly, ihe bodiy gown, over my heart.

    The coach came, and we were ready. Mrs Cream saw us to the door. Maud wore a veil. I helped her dowilting staircase, and

    she gripped my arm. Wheepped out of the cottage she gripped it tighter. She had kept to her room for more than a week. She flinched from the sight of the sky and the black church, and seemed to feel the soft air hard upon her cheek, even through her veil, like a hand that slapped her.

    I put my fingers over hers.

    God bless you, maam! cried Mrs Cream, wheleman had paid her. She stood and watched us. The boy who had taken our horse, that first night, noeared again, to see us leaving; and one or two other boys also came to stare, and to stand at the side of the coach, pigat the doors, where an old gold crest had been painted out black. The driver flicked his whip at them. He fastened s upon the roof, thehe steps dowleman handed Maud in, drawing her fingers from mine. He caught my eye.

    Now, now, he said, in a warning sort of way. No time for se.

    She sat and leaned her head back, a beside her. I sat opposite. There were no hao the doors, only a key, like the key to a safe: when the driver closed them Gentleman made them fast, then put the key in his pocket.

    How long will we travel? asked Maud.

    He said, An hour.

    It seemed lohan an hour. It seemed like a life. The day was a warm one. Where the sun struck the glass it made the carriage very hot, but the windows had been fixed not to open—I suppose, so a lunatic should not have the ce to leap out. At last Gentleman pulled a cord to make the blinds close, a jolting in the heat and the darkness, not speaking. In time I began to grow sick. I saw Mauds head rolling against the padding of the seat, but could not see if her eyes were open or closed. She kept her hands before her, clasped.

    Gentleman fidgeted, however, loosening his collar, looking at his watch, plug at his cuffs. Two or three times he took out his handkerchief and wiped off his brow. Every time the coach slowed, he leaned close to the window to peer through the louvres. Then it

    slowed so hard it came almost to a stop, and began to turn: he looked again, sat straight and tightened his ie.

    We are almost there, he said.

    Maud turned her head to him. The coach slowed again. I pulled the cord that moved the blinds. We were at the start of a green lane, with a stone arch across it and, beh that, iron gates. A man was drawing them back. The coach gave a jerk, and we drove along the lail we reached the house at the end. It was just like at Briar, though this house was smaller, aer. Its windows had bars on them. I watched Maud, to see what she would do. She had put back her veil and was gazing from the window in her old dull way; but behind the dullness I thought I saw a rising kind of knowledge or dread.

    Dont be afraid, said Gentleman.

    That was all he said. I dont know if he said it to her, or to me. The coach made aurn, and stopped. Dr Graves and Dr Christie were there, waiting for us, with beside them a great stout woman, her sleeves pushed up to her elbows and her gown covered over with an apron of vas, like a butchers. Dr Christie came forward. He had a key like Gentlemans, a up the lock from his side. Maud fli the sound. Gentleman put his hand upon her. Dr Christie made a bow.

    Good day, he said. Mr Rivers. Miss Smith. Mrs Rivers, you remember me of course?

    He held out his hand.

    He held it to me.

    There was a sed, I think, of perfect stillness. I looked at him, and he nodded. Mrs Rivers? he said again. Theleman leaned and caught hold of my arm. I thought at first he meant to keep me in my seat; then I uood that he was trying to press me from it. The doctor took my other arm. They got me to my feet. My shoes caught upoeps. I said,

    Wait! What are you doing? What—?

    Dont struggle, Mrs Rivers, said the doctor. We are here to care for you.

    He waved his hand, and Dr Graves and the woman came forward. I said,

    Its not me you want! What are you doing? Mrs Rivers? Im Susan Smith! Gentlemalemahem!

    Dr Christie shook his head.

    Still keeping up the old, sad fi? he said to Gentleman.

    Gentleman nodded and said nothing, as if he were too unhappy to speak. I hope he was! He turned and took down one of the bags—one of Mauds mothers bags. Dr Christie held me tighter. Now, he said, how  you be Susan Smith, late of Whelk Street, Mayfair? Dont you know theres no such place? e, you do know it. And we shall have you admitting it, though it take us a year. Now, dont twist so, Mrs Rivers! You are spoiling your handsome dress.

    I had struggled against his grip. At his words, I grew slack. I gazed at my sleeve of silk, and at my own arm, that had got plump and smooth with careful feeding; and then at the bag at my feet, with its letters of brass—the M, and the L.

    It was in that sed that I guessed, at last, the filthy trick that Gentleman had played on me.

    I howled.

    You bloody swine! I cried, twisting again, and pulling towards him. You fuckster! Oh!

    He stood in the doorway of the coach, making it tilt. The dripped me harder and his face grew stern.

    Theres no place for words like those in my house, Mrs Rivers, he said.

    You sod, I said to him. t you see what hes done? t you see the dodge of it? It aint me you want, its—

    I still pulled, aill held me; but now I looked past him, to the swaying coach. Gentleman had moved back, his hand before his face. Beyond him, the light in bars upon her from the louvred blinds, sat Maud. Her face was thin, her hair was dull. Her dress was worn with use, like a servants dress. Her eyes were wild, with tears starting in them; but beyond the tears, her gaze was hard. Hard as marble, hard as brass.

    Hard as a pearl, and the grit that lies i.

    Dr Christie saw me looking.

    Now, why do you stare? he said. You know your own maid, I think?

    I could not speak. She could, however. She said, in a trembling voiot her own:

    My own poor mistress. Oh! My heart is breaking!

    You thought her a pigeon. Pigeon, my arse. That bitew everything. She had been in on it from the start.

 Part II Chapter Seven

    The start,  I  think I  know too well.  It is the first of my mistakes.

    I imagiable, slick with blood. The blood is my mothers. There is too much of it. There is so much of it, I think it runs, like ink. I think, to save the boards beh, the women have set down a bowls; and so the silences between my mothers cries are filled—drip drop! drip drop!—with what might be the staggered beating of clocks. Beyond the beat e other, fainter cries: the shrieks of lunatics, the shouts and scolds of nurses. For this is a madhouse. My mother is mad. The table has straps upon it to keep her from plunging to the floor; arap separates her jaws, to prevent the biting of her tongue; another keeps apart her legs, so that I might emerge from between them. When I am born, the straps remain: the women fear she will tear me in two! They put me upon her bosom and my mouth finds out her breast. I suck, and the

    house falls silent about me. There is only, still, that falling blood— drip drop! drip, drop!—the beat telling off the first few minutes of my life, the last of hers. For soon, the clocks run slow. My mothers bosom rises, falls, rises again; then sinks for ever.

    I feel it, and suck harder. Then the women pluck me from her. And when I weep, they hit me.

    I pass my first ten years a daughter to the nurses of the house. I believe they love me. There is a tabby cat upon the wards, and I think they keep me, rather as they keep that cat, a thing to pet and dress with ribbons. I wear a slate-grey gown cut like their oron and a cap; they give me a belt with a ring of miniature keys upon it, and call me little nurse. I sleep with each of them in turn, in their own beds, and follow them in their duties upon the madhouse wards. The house is a large one—seems larger to me, I suppose—and divided in two: one side for female lunatics, one side for male. I see only the female. I never mind them. Some of them kiss a me, as the nurses do. Some of them touch my hair and weep. I remind them of their daughters. Others are troublesome, and these I am enced to stand before and strike with a wooden wand, cut to my hand, until the nurses laugh and say they never saw anything so droll.

    Thus I learn the rudiments of discipline and order; and ially apprehend the attitudes of insanity. This will all prove useful, later.

    When I am old enough to reason I am given a g said to be my fathers, the portrait of a lady called my mother, and uand I am an orphan; but, never having knoarents love—or rather, having known the favours of a score of mothers—I am not greatly troubled by the news. I think the nurses clothe and feed me, for my own sake. I am a plain-faced child but, in that childless world, pass for a beauty. I have a sweet singing void an eye for letters. I I suppose I shall live out all my days a nurse, tentedly teasing lunatitil I die.

    So we believe, at nine and ten. Some time in my eleventh year, I am summoo the nurses parlour by the matron of the house. I imagine she means to make me some treat. I am wrong. Instead, she

    greets me strangely, and will not meet my eye. There is a person with her—a gentleman, she says—but then, the word means little to me. It will mean more, in time. Step closer, the matron says. The gentleman watches. He wears a suit of black, and a pair of black silk gloves. He holds a e with an ivory knob, upon which he leans, the better to study me. His hair is black tending to white, his cheek cadaverous, his eyes imperfectly hidden by a pair of classes. An ordinary child might shrink from gazing at him; but I know nothing of ordinary children, and am afraid of no-one. I walk until I stand before him. He parts his lips, to pass his tongue across them. His tongue is dark at the tip.

    Shes undersize, he says; but makes enough h her feet, for all that. Hows her voice?

    His own voice is low, tremulous, plaining, like the shadow of a shivering man.

    Say a word to the gentleman, says the matron quietly. Say how you are.

    I am very well, I say. Perhaps I speak stoutly. The gentleman winces.

    That will do, he says, raising his hand. Then: I hope you  whisper? I hope you od?

    I nod. Oh yes.

    I hope you  be silent?

    I .

    Be silent, then.—Thats better. He turns to the matron. I see she wears her mothers likeness. Very good. It will remind her of her mothers fate, and may serve to keep her from sharing it. I dont care at all for her lip, however. It is too plump. It has a bad promise. Likewise her back, which is soft, and slouches. And what of her leg? I shant want a thick-legged girl. Why do you hide her leg behind so long a skirt? Did I ask for that?

    The matron colours. It has been a harmless sport of the women, sir, to keep her dressed in the e of the house.

    Have I paid you, to provide sport for nurses?

    He moves his stick upon the rug, and works his jaws. He turns again to me, but speaks to her. He says, How well does she read?

    How fair is her hand? e, give her a piece of text a her demonstrate.

    The matron hands me an open Bible. I read a passage from it, and again the gentleman winces. Softly! he says, until I speak it in a murmur. Then he has me write the passage out while he looks on.

    A girls hand, he says, when I have finished, and burdened with serifs. But he sounds pleased, heless.

    I am also pleased. I uand from his words that I have marked the paper with the marks of angels. Later I will wish that I had scrawled and blotted the page. The fair characters are my undoing. The gentleman leans harder upon his stid tilts his head so low I  see, above the wire of his spectacles, the bloodless rims of his eyes.

    Well, miss, he says, how should you like to e and live in my house? Dont push your pert lip at me, mind! How should you like to e to me, and lear ways and plaiers?

    He might have struck me. I should like it not at all, I say at once.

    The matron says, For shame, Maud!

    The gentleman snorts. Perhaps, he says, she has her mothers unlucky temper after all. She has her dainty foot, at least. So you like to stamp, miss? Well, my house is a large one. We shall find a room for you to stamp in, far away from my fine ears; and you may work yourself into fits there, no-one shall mind you; and perhaps we shall mind you so little we shall fet to feed you, and then you shall die. How should you like that—hmm?

    He rises and dusts down his coat, that has no dust upon it. He gives some instru to the matron and does not look at me again. When he has gone, I take up the Bible I have read from and throw it to the floor.

    I will not go! I cry. He shall not make me!

    The matron draws me to her. I have seeake a whip to fractious lunatics, but now she clutches me to her apron and weeps like a girl, and tells me gravely what my future is to be, in the house of my uncle.

    Some men have farmers raise them veal-calves. My mothers brother has had the house of nurses raise him me. Now he means to

    take me home and make me ready for the roast. All at once, I must give up my little madhouse gown, my ring of keys, my wand: he sends his housekeeper with a suit of clothes, to dress me to his fancy. She brings me boots, wool gloves, a gown of buff—a hateful, girlish gown, cut to the calf, and stiffened from the shoulder to the waist with ribs of bone. She pulls the laces tight and, at my plaints, pulls them tighter. The nurses watch her, sighing. When it es time for her to take me, they kiss me and hide their eyes. Then one of them quickly puts a pair of scissors to my head, to take a curl of hair to keep inside a locket; and, the others seeing her do that, they seize the shears from her, or take up knives and scissors of their olud grasp at me until my hair tears at the root. They read squabble over the falling tresses like gulls— their voices rousing the lunati their own close rooms, making them shriek. My uncles servant hurries me from them. She has a carriage with a driver. The madhouse gate shuts hard behind us.

    What a place to raise a girl in! she says, passing a handkerchief across her lip.

    I will not speak to her. My strait gown cuts me and makes my breath e quick, and my boots chafe at my ankles. My wool gloves prickle—at last I tear them from my hands. She watches me do it, platly. Got a temper, have you? she says. She has a basket of knitting and a parcel of food. There are bread rolls, a packet of salt and three white eggs, boiled hard. She rolls two of the eggs across her skirt, to break their shells. The flesh inside is grey, the yolk as dry as powder. I will remember the st of it. The third egg she play lap. I will  it, but let it jerk there until it falls upon the carriage floor and is spoiled. Tut tut, she says at that. She takes out her knitting, then her head droops and she sleeps. I sit beside her, stiff, in a miserable rage. The hoes slowly, the journey seems long. Sometimes we pass through trees. Then my face shows in the window-glass, dark as blood.

    I have seen no house but the madhouse I was born in. I am used to grimness and solitude, high walls and shuttered windows. It is the stillness of my uncles house that bewilders and frightehat first day. The carriage stops at a door, split down the middle

    into two high, bulging leaves: as we watch, they are tugged from within ao tremble. The man who opens them is dressed in dark silk breeches and what I take to be a powdered hat. Thats Mr Way, your ueward, says the woman, her face beside mine. Mr Way observes me, then looks at her; I think she must make some gesture with her eyes. The driver puts the steps down for us, but I will not let him take my hand; and when Mr Way makes me a bow, I think he does it to tease—for I have many times seen nurses curtsey, laughing, to lady lunatics. He shows me past him, into a darkhat seems to lap at my buff gown. When he closes the door, the dark at once grows deeper. My ears feel full, as if with water or with wax. That is the silehat my uncle cultivates in his house, as other men grow vines and fl creepers.

    The woman takes me up a staircase while Mr Way looks on. The stairs are not quite even, and the rug is sometimes torn: my new boots make me clumsy, and once I fall. e up, child, says the woman when I do that; and now whes her hand upon me, I let it stay there. We climb two flights. I grow more frightehe higher we go. For the house seems awful to me—the ceilings high, the walls not like the smooth undecorated walls of the madhouse, but filled with portraits, shields and rusting blades, creatures in frames and cases. The staircase turns upon itself, to make a gallery about the hall; at every turning there are passages. In the shadows of these, pale and half-hidden—like expet grubs, in the cells of a hive—there stand servants, e to see me make my progress through the house.

    I do not know them for servants, however. I see their aprons and suppose them nurses. I think the shadowy passages must hold rooms, with quiet lunatics.

    Why do they watch? I say to the woman.

    Why, to see your face, she answers. To see if you turned out handsome as your mother.

    I have twenty mothers, I say at that; and am handsomer than any of them.

    The woman has stopped before a door. Handsome is as hand-

    some does, she says. I mean your proper mother, that died. These were her rooms, and are now to be yours.

    She takes me into the chamber beyond, and then into the dressing-room that joins it. The windows rattle as if battered by fists. They are chill rooms even in summer, and it is winter now. I go to the little fire—I am too small to see my fa the glass above—and stand and shiver.

    Should have kept your mittens, says the woman, seeing me breathe upon my hands. Mr Inkers daughter shall have those. She takes my cloak from me, then draws the ribbons from my hair and brushes it with a broken b. Tug all you like, she says as I pull away. It shall only hurt you, it shant harm me. Why, what a busihose women made of your head! Anyone would have supposed them savages. How Im to see you , after their work, I t say. Now, look here. She reaches beh the bed. Lets see you use your chamber-pot. e along, no foolish modesty. Do you think I never saw a little girl lift up her skirts and piddle?

    She folds her arms and watches me, and thes a cloth with water and washes my fad hands.

    I saw them do this for your mother, when I arlourmaid here, she says, pulling me about. She was a deal gratefuller than you are. Didnt they teaanners, in that house of yours?

    I long for my little wooden wand: I would show her all Id learned of manners, then! But I have observed lunatics, too, and know how tle while only seeming to stand limp. At length she steps from me and wipes her hands.

    Lord, what a child! I hope your uncle knows his business, bringing you here. He seems to think hell make a lady of you.

    I dont want to be a lady! I say. My uncle ake me.

    I should say he  do what he likes, in his own house, she answers. There now! How late youve made us.

    There has e the stifled ringing of a bell, three times. It is a clock; I uand it, however, as a signal to the house, for I have been raised to the sound of similar bells, that told the lunatics to rise, to dress, to say their prayers, to take their dinners. I think,

    Now I shall see them!, but when we go from the room the house is still and quiet as before. Evechful servants have retired. Again my boots cat the carpets. Walk softly! says the woman in a whisper, ping my arm. Heres your uncles room, look.

    She knocks, then takes me in. He has had paint put on the windows years before, and the winter sun striking the glass, the room is lit strangely. The walls are dark with the spines of books. I think them a kind of frieze or carving. I know only two books, and one is blad creased about the spihat is the Bible. The other is a book of hymns thought suitable for the demented; and that is pink. I suppose all printed words to be true ones.

    The womas me very he door and stands at my back, her hands like claws upon my shoulders. The man they have called my uncle rises from behind his desk; its surface is hidden by a mess of papers. Upon his head is a velvet cap with a swinging tassel on a fraying thread. Before his eyes is another, paler, pair of classes.

    So, miss, he says, stepping towards me, moving his jaw. The woman makes a curtsey. How is her temper, Mrs Stiles? he asks her.

    Rather ill, sir.

    I  see it, in her eye. Where are her gloves?

    Threw them aside, sir. Wouldnt have them.

    My uncle es close. An unhappy beginning. Give me your hand, Maud.

    I will not give it. The woman catches my arm about the wrist and lifts it. My hand is small, and plump at the knuckles. I am used to washing with madhouse soap, which is not kind. My nails are dark, with madhouse dirt. My uncle holds my finger-ends. His own hand has a smear or two of ink upon it. He shakes his head.

    Now, did I want a set of coarse fingers upon my books, he says, I should have had Mrs Stiles bring me a nurse. I should not have given her a pair of gloves, to make those coarse hands softer. Your hands I shall have soft, however. See here, how we make childrens hands soft, that are kept out of their gloves. He puts his own hand to the pocket of his coat, and uncoils from it—one of those things,

    that bookmen use—a line of metal beads, bound tight with silk, for keeping down springing pages. He makes a loop of it, seeming to weigh it; then he brings it smartly down upon my dimpling knuckles. Then, with Mrs Stiless assistance, he takes my other hand and does the same to that.

    The beads sting like a whip; but the silk keeps the flesh from breaking. At the first blow I yelp, like a dog—in pain, in rage and sheer astonishment. Then, Mrs Stiles releasing my wrists, I put my fio my mouth and begin to weep.

    My uncle wi the sound. He returns the beads to his pocket and his hands flutter towards his ears.

    Keep silence, girl! he says. I shake and rs Stiles pihe flesh of my shoulder, and that makes me cry harder. Then my uncle draws forth the beads again; and at last I grow still.

    Well, he says quietly. You shant fet the gloves in future, hmm?

    I shake my head. He almost smiles. He looks at Mrs Stiles. Youll keep my niece mindful of her new duties? I want her made quite tame. I t have storms and tantrums, here. Very well. He waves his hand. Now, leave her with me. Dont stray too far, mind! You must be in reach of her, should she grow wild.

    Mrs Stiles makes a curtsey and—under cover of plug my trembling shoulder as if to keep it from falling into a slouch—gives me another pinch. The yellow window grows bright, then dim, then bright again, as the wind sends clouds across the sun.

    Now, says my uncle, when the housekeeper has gone. You know, do you not, why I have brought you here.

    I put my crimson fio my face, to wipe my nose.

    To make a lady of me.

    He gives a quick, dry laugh.

    To make a secretary of you. What do you see here, all about these walls?

    Wood, sir.

    Books, girl, he says. He goes and draws one from its plad turns it. The cover is black, by which I reise it as a Bible. The others, I deduce, hold hymns. I suppose that hymn-books, after all,

    might be bound in different hues, perhaps as suiting different qualities of madness. I feel this, as a great advan thought.

    My uncle keeps the book in his hand, close to his breast, and taps its spine.

    Do you see this title, girl?—Dont take a step! I asked you to read, not to prance.

    But the book is too far from me. I shake my head, and feel my tea<tt></tt>rs return.

    Ha! cries my uncle, seeing my distress. I should say you t! Look down, miss, at the floor. Down! Further! Do you see that hand, beside your shoe? That hand was set there at my word, after sultation with an oculist—an eye-doctor. These are unon books, Miss Maud, and not for ordinary gazes. Let me see you step once past that pointing finger, and I shall use you as I would a servant of the house, caught doing the same—I shall whip your eyes until they bleed. That hand marks the bounds of innoce here. Cross it you shall, in time; but at my word, and when you are ready. You uand me, hmm?

    I do not. How could I? But I am already grown cautious, and nod as if I do. He puts the book ba its place, lingering a moment over the-aligning of the spine upon the shelf.

    The spine is a fine one, and—I will know it well, in time—a favourite of his. The title is—

    But now I run ahead of my own innoce; which is vouchsafed to me a little while yet.

    After my uncle has spoken he seems tet me. I stand for another quarter-hour before he lifts his head and catches sight of me, and waves me from the room. I struggle a moment with the iron handle of his door, making him wince against the grinding of the lever; and when I close it, Mrs Stiles darts from the gloom to lead me back upstairs. I suppose youre hungry, she says, as we walk. Little girls always are. I should say youd be grateful for a white egg now.

    I am hungry, but will not admit to it. But she rings firl to e, and the girl brings a biscuit and a glass of sweet red wine. She sets them down before me, and smiles; and the smile is harder to

    bear, somehow, than a slap would have been. I am afraid I will weep again. But I swallow my tears with my dry biscuit, and the girl and Mrs Stiles stand together, whispering and watg. Then they leave me quite alohe room grows dark. I lie upon the sofa with my head upon a cushion, and pull my own little cloak over myself, with my own little whipped, red hands. The wine makes me sleep. When I wake again, I wake to shifting shadows, and to Mrs Stiles at the door, bringing a lamp. I wake with a terrible fear, and a sense of many hours having passed. I think the bell has retly tolled. I believe it is seven ht oclock.

    I say, I should like, if you please, to be taken home now.

    Mrs Stiles laughs. Do you mean to that house, with thh women? What a plaqe to call your home!

    I should think they miss me.

    I should say they are glad to be rid of you—the nasty, pale-faced little thing that you are. e here. Its your bed-time. She has pulled me from the sofa, and begins to unlace my gown. I tug away from her, and strike her. She catches my arm and gives it a twist.

    I say, Youve nht to hurt me! Youre nothing to me! I want my mothers, that love me!

    Heres your mother, she says, plug at the portrait at my throat. Thats all the mother youll have here. Be grateful you have that, to know her face by. Now, stand aeady. You must wear this, to give you the figure of a lady.

    She has takeiff buff dress from me, and all the lineh. Now she laces me tight in a girlish corset that grips me harder than the gown. Over this she puts a nightdress. On to my hands she pulls a pair of white skin gloves, which she stitches at the wrists. Only my feet remain bare. I fall upon the sofa and kick them. She catches me up and shakes me, then holds me still.

    See here, she says, her face crimson and white, her breath ing hard upon my cheek. I had a little daughter ohat died. She had a fine black head of curling hair and a temper like a lambs. Why dark-haired, geempered children should be made to die, and peevish pale girls like you to thrive, I ot say. Why

    your mother, with all her fortune, should have turned out trash and perished, while I must live to keep your fingers smooth and see you grow into a lady, is a puzzle. Weep all the artful tears you like. You shall never make my hard heart the softer.

    She catches me up and takes me to the dressing-room, makes me climb into the great, high, dusty bed, thes down the curtains. There is a door beside the ey-breast: she tells me it leads to another chamber, and a bad-tempered girl sleeps there. The girl will listen in the night, and if I am anything but still and good and quiet, she will hear; and her hand is very hard.

    Say your prayers, she says, and ask Our Father tive you.

    Theakes up the lamp and leaves, and I am plunged in an awful darkness.

    I think it a terrible thing to do to a child; I think it terrible, even now. I lie, in an agony of misery and fear, straining my ears against the silence—wide awake, sick, hungry, cold, alone, in a dark so deep the shifting blay own eye-lids seems the brighter. My corset holds me like a fist. My knuckles, tugged into their stiff skin gloves, are starting out in bruises. Now and then the great clock shifts its gears, and chimes; and I draw what fort I  from my idea that somewhere in the house walk lunatics, and with them watchful hen I begin to wonder over the habits of the place. Perhaps here they give their lunatics lice to wander; perhaps a madwoman will e to my room, mistaking it for another? Perhaps the wicked-tempered girl that sleeps  door is herself demented, and will e and throttle me with h.9９ｌib.er hard hand! Indeed, no sooner has this idea risen ihan I begin to hear the smothered sounds of movement, close by—unnaturally close, they seem to me to be: I imagihousand skulking figures with their faces at the curtain, a thousand searg hands. I begin to cry. The corset I wear makes the tears e strangely. I long to lie still, so the lurking women shall not guess that I am there; but the stiller I try to be, the more wretched I grow. Presently, a spider or a moth brushing my cheek, I imagihe throttling hand has e at last, and jerk in a vulsion and, I suppose, shriek.

    There es the sound of an opening door, a light between the

    seams of the curtain. A face appears, close to my own—a kind faot the face of a lunatic, but that of the girl who earlier brought my little tea of biscuits and sweet wine. She is dressed in her nightgown, and her hair is let down.

    Now, then, she says softly. Her hand is not hard. She puts it to my head and strokes my face, and I grow calmer. My tears flow naturally I say I have been afraid of lunatics, and she laughs.

    There are no lunatics here, she says. You are thinking of that other plaow, arent you glad, to have left there? I shake my head. She says, Well, it is only strange for you here. You will soon grow used to it.

    She takes up her light. I see her do it, and begin at once again to cry.—Why, you shall be asleep in a moment! she says.

    I say I do not like the darkness. I say I am frighteo lie alone. She hesitates, thinking perhaps of Mrs Stiles. But I dare say my bed is softer than hers; and besides, it is winter, and fearfully cold. She says at last that she will lie with me until I sleep. She snuffs her dle, I smell the smoke upon the darkness.

    She tells me her name is Barbara. She lets me rest my head against her. She says, Now, isnt this nice as your old home? And shant you like it here?

    I say I think I shall like it a little, if she will lie with me every night; and at that she laughs again, theles herself more fortably upon the feather mattress.

    She sleeps at once, and heavily, as housemaids do. She smells of a violet face-cream. Her gown has ribbons upon it, at the breast, and I find them out with my gloved hands and hold them while I wait for sleep to e—as if I am tumbling into the perfect darkness and they are the ropes that will save me.

    I am telling you this so that you might appreciate the forces that work upon me, making me what I am.

    day, I am kept to my two bleak rooms and made to sew. I fet my terrors of the darkness of t<u>?9９lib.</u>he night, then. My gloves make me clumsy, the needle pricks my fingers. I shant do it! I cry,

    tearing the cloth. Then Mrs Stiles beats me. My gown and corset being so stiff, she hurts her palm iriking of my back. I take what little solation I might, from that.

    I am beaten often, I believe, in my first days there. How could it be otherwise? I have known lively habits, the clamour of the wards, the dotings of twenty women; now the hush and regularity of my uncles house drives me to fits and foaming tempers. I am an amiable child, I think, made wilful by restraint. I dash cups and saucers from the table to the floor. I lie and kick my legs until the boots fly from my heels. I scream until my throat bleeds. My passions are met with punishments, each fiercer than the last. I am bound about the wrists and mouth. I am shut into lonely rooms, or into cupboards. Oime—having overturned a dle ahe flame lap at the fringes of a chair until they smoke—I am taken by Mr Way into the park and carried, along a lonely path, to the ice-house. I dont remember, now, the chill of the place; I remember the blocks of grey ice—I should have supposed them clear, like crystal—that ti the wintry silence, like so many clocks. They tick for three hours. When Mrs Stiles es to release me I have made myself a kind of  and ot be uncurled, and am as weak as if they had drugged me.

    I think that frightens her. She carries me back quietly, by the servants stairs, and she and Barbara bathe me, then rub my arms with spirits.

    If she loses the use of her hands, my God, hell have our characters for ever!

    It is something, to see her made afraid. I plain of pains in my fingers, and weakness, for a day or two after that, and watch her flutter; then I fet myself, and pinch her—and by that, she knows my grip is a strong one, and soon punishes me again.

    This makes a period of, perhaps a month; though to my childish mind it seems longer. My uncle waits, all that time, as he might wait for the breaking of a horse. Now and then he has Mrs Stiles duct me to his library, and questions her as to my progress.

    How do we do, Mrs Stiles?

    Still badly, sir.

    Still fierce?

    Fierce, and snappish.

    Youve tried your hand?

    She nods. He sends us away. Then ore shows of temper, mes and tears. At night, Barbara shakes her head.

    What a dot of a girl, to be so naughty! Mrs Stiles says she never saw such a little Tartar as you. Why t you be good?

    I was good, in my last home—and see how I was rewarded!  m I upturn my chamber-pot and tread the mess into the carpet. Mrs Stiles throws up her hands and screams; then strikes my face. Then, half-clad and dazed as I am, she drags me from my dressing-room to my uncles door.

    He flinches from the sight of us. Good God, what is it?

    Oh, a frightful thing, sir!

    Not more of her violence? And do y her here, where she might break out, among the books?

    But he lets her speak, looking all the time at me. I stand very stiff, with a hand at my hot face, my pale hair loose about my shoulders.

    At length he takes off his spectacles and closes his eyes. His eyes appear o me, and very soft at the lids. He raises his thumb and smudged forefio the bridge of his nose, and pinches.

    Well, Maud, he says as he does it, this is sorry news. Here is Mrs Stiles, and here am I, and here are all my staff, all waiting on yood manners. I had hoped the nurses had raised you better than this. I had hoped to find you biddable. He es towards me, blinking, and puts his hand upon my face. Dont shrink so, girl! I want only to examine your cheek. It is hot, I think. Well, Mrs Stiless hand is a large one. He looks about him. e, what have we that is cool, hmm?

    He has a slim brass knife, blunt-edged, for cutting pages. He stoops and puts the blade of it against my face. His manner is mild, and frightens me. His voice is soft as a girls. He says, I am sorry to see you hurt, Maud. Indeed I am. Do you suppose I want you harmed? Why should I want that? It is you who must want it, since you provoke it so. I think you must like to be struck.—That is cooler, is it not? He has turhe blade. I shiver. My bare arms

    creep with cold. He moves his mouth. All waiting, he repeats, on yood manners. Well, we are good at that, at Briar. We  wait, and wait, and wait again. Mrs Stiles and my staff are paid to do it; I am a scholar, and ined to it by nature. Look about you here, at my colle. Do you suppose this the work of an impatient man? My books e to me slowly, from obscure sources. I have tentedly passed many tedious weeks in expectation of poorer volumes than you! He laughs, a dry laugh that might once have been moist; moves the point of the ko a spot beh my ; tilts up my fad looks it over. Thes the knife fall, and moves away. He tucks the wires of his spectacles behind his ears.

    I advise you to whip her, Mrs Stiles, he says, if she prove troublesome again.

    Perhaps children are like horses after all, and may be broken. My uurns to his mess of papers, dismissing us; and I go docilely bay sewing. It is not the prospect of a whipping that makes me meek. It is what I know of the cruelty of patiehere is no patience so terrible as that of the deranged. I have seen lunatics labour at easks—veying sand from one leaking cup into another; ting the stitches in a fraying gown, or the motes in a sunbeam; filling invisible ledgers with the resulting sums. Had they beelemen, and ristead of women—then perhaps they would have passed as scholars and aaffs.—I ot say. And of course, these are thoughts that e to me later, when I know the full measure of my uncles particular mania. That day, in my childish way, I glimpse only its surface. But I see that it is dark, and know that it is silent—indeed, its substance is the substance of the darkness and the silence which fills my uncles house like water or like wax.

    Should I struggle, it will draw me deep into itself, and I will drown.

    I do not wish, then, to do that.

    I cease struggling at all, and surrender myself to its viscid, circular currents.

    That is the first day, perhaps, of my education. But  day, at

    eight, begin my lessons proper. I never have a governess: my uors me himself, having Mr Way set a desk and a stool for me close to the pointing finger on his library floor. The stool is high: my legs swing from it and the weight of my shoes makes them tingle and finally grow numb. Should I fidget, however—should I cough, or shen my uncle will e and snap at my fingers with the rope of silk-covered beads. His patience has curious lapses, after all; and though he claims to be free of a desire to harm me, he harms me pretty often.

    Still, the library is kept warmer than my own room, to ward off mould from the books; and I find I prefer to write, than to sew. He gives me a pencil with a soft lead that moves silently upon paper, and a green-shaded reading-lamp, to save my eyes.

    The lamp smells, as it heats, of smouldering dust: a curious smell—I shall grow to hate it!—the smell of the parg of my own youth.

    My work itself is of the most tedious kind, and sists chiefly of copying pages of text, from antique volumes, into a leather-bound book. The book is a slim one, and when it is filled my job is to re blank again with a piece of india-rubber. I remember this task, more than I remember the pieatter I am made to copy: for the pages, from endless fri, grow smudged and fragile and liable to tear; and the sight of a smudge on a leaf of text, or the sound of tearing paper, is more than my uncle, in his delicacy,  bear. They say children, as a rule, fear the ghosts of the dead; what I fear most as a child are the spectres of past lessons, imperfectly erased.

    I call them lessons; but I am not taught as irls are. I learn to recite, softly and clearly; I am aught to sing. I never learn the names of flowers and birds, but am schooled instead in the hides with which books are bound—as say, morocco, russia, calf, chagrin; and their papers—Dutch, a, motley, silk. I learn inks; the cutting of pens; the uses of pouhe styles and sizes of founts: sans-serif, antique, Egyptian, pica, brevier, emerald, ruby, Pearl. . . They are named for jewels. It is a cheat. For they are hard and dull as ders in a grate.

    But I learn quickly. The season turns. I am made small rewards: new gloves, soft-soled slippers, a gown—stiff as the first, but of velvet. I am allowed to take my supper in the dining-room, at one end of a great oak table, set with silver. My us at the other end. He keeps a reading-easel beside his place, and speaks very seldom; but if I should be so unlucky as to let fall a fork, or to jar my knife against my plate, then he will raise his fad fix me with a damp and terrible eye. Have you some weakness about the hands, Maud, that obliges you to grind your silver in that way?

    The knife is toe and too heavy, Uncle, I answer him fretfully once.

    Then he has my kaken away, and I must eat with my fingers. The dishes he prefers being all bloody meats, as, and calves feet, my kid-skin gloves grow crimson—as if reverting to the substahey were made from. My appetite leaves me. I care most for the wine. I am served it in a crystal glass engraved with an M. The ring of silver that holds my napkin is marked a tarnished black with the same initial. They are to keep me mindful, not of my name, but of that of my mother; which was Marianne.

    She is buried in the lo spot of all that lonely park—hers a solitary grey stone among so many white. I am taken to see it, and made to keep the tomb .

    Be grateful that you may, says Mrs Stiles, watg me trim the springiery grass, her arms folded across her bosom. Who shall tend my grave? I shall be all but fotten.

    Her husband is dead. Her son is a sailor. She has taken all her little daughters curling black hair to make ors with. She brushes my own hair as if the locks are thorns and might cut her; I wish they were. I think she is sorry not to whip me. She still bruises my arms with pinches. My obedienrages her more than ever my passions did; and seeing that, I grow meeker, with a hard, artful meekhat, receiving the edge of her sorrow, keeps it sharp. That provokes her to the pihey are profitless enough— and to scolds, which pay more, as being revealing of her griefs. I take her often to the graves, and make certain to sigh, to the full strength of my lungs, over my mothers stone. In time—so ing

    am I!—I find out the name of her dead daughter; then, the kit cat giving birth to a litter of kittens, I take one for a pet, and  for her. I make sure to call it loudest when Mrs Stiles is near: e, Polly! Oh, Polly! What a pretty child you are! How fine your black fur is! e, kiss your mama.

    Do you see, what circumstances make of me?

    Mrs Stiles trembles and winks at the words.

    Take the filthy creature arid have Mr Inker drown it! she says to Barbara, when she  bear it no more.

    I run and hide my face. I think of my lost home, and the hat loved me, and the thought brings the hot tears coolly to my eyes.

    Oh, Barbara! I cry. Say you shant! Say you wouldnt!

    Barbara says she never could. Mrs Stiles sends her away.

    Youre a sly, hateful child, she says. Dont think Barbara dont know it. Dont think she t see through you and your designing ways.

    But it is she who cries then, i hard sobs; and my own eyes soon dry iudying of hers. For what is she, to me? What is anyone now? I had thought my mothers, the nurses, might send to save me; six months go by—another six, another—and they send nothing. I am assured they have fottehink of you? says Mrs Stiles, with a laugh. Why, I dare say your place at the madhouse has been filled by a new little girl with a happier temper. I am sure, they were glad to be rid of you. In time, I believe her. I begin tet. My old life grows shadowy in proportion to the new—or, sometimes emerges to darken or trouble it, in dreams and half-memories, just as those smudged strokes of fotten lessons now and then start out upon the pages of my copy-book.

    My proper mother I hate. Didnt she forsake me, before anyone? I keep her portrait in a little wooden box beside my bed; but her sweet white face has nothing of me in it, and I grow to loathe it. Let me kiss mama good-night, I say oime, unlog my box. But I do it only to torment Mrs Stiles. I raise the picture to my lips and, while she looks on, thinking me sorry—I hate you, I whisper, my breath tarnishing the gold. I do it that night, and the night which

    follows, and the night which follows that; at last, as a ust tick tular beat, I find I must do it or lie fretful in my bed. And then, the portrait must be set dowly, with its ribbon quite uncreased. If the frame strikes the velvet lining of the wooden box too hard, I will take it out a down carefully again.

    Mrs Stiles watches me do it, with a curious expression. I never lie quite still until Barbara es.

    Meanwhile my uncle observes my work and finds my letters, my hand, my voice, greatly improved. He is used occasionally to eainilemen at Briar: now he has me stand for them and read. I read from fs, not uanding the matter I am made to recite; and the gentlemen—like Mrs Stiles—watch me strangely. I grow used to that. When I have finished, at my uncles instru I curtsey. I curtsey well. The gentlemen clap, then e to shake or stroke my hand. They tell me, often, how rare I am. I believe myself a kind y, and pink uheir gazes.

    So white blooms blush, before they curl and tumble. One day I arrive at my uncles room to find my little desk removed, and a place made ready for me among his books. He sees my look, and bee to him.

    Take off yloves, he says. I do, and shudder to touch the surfaces of on things. It is a cold, still, sunless day. I have been at Briar, then, two years. My cheek is round as a childs, and my voice is high. I have not yet begun to bleed as women do.

    Well, Maud, says my u last you cross the finger of brass, and e to my books. You are about to learn the proper quality of your vocation. Are you afraid?

    A little, sir.

    You do well to be. For here is fearful matter. You think me a scholar, hmm?

    Yes, sir.

    Well, I am more than that. I am a curator of poisons. These books—look, mark them! mark them well!—they are the poisons I mean. And this— Here he reverently puts his hand upon the great pile of ink-stained papers that litter his desk—this is their Index.

    This will guide others in their colle and proper study. There is no work on the subject so perfect as this will be, when it is plete. I have devoted many years to its stru and revision; and shall devote many more, as the work requires it. I have laboured so long among poisons I am immuo them, and my aim has been to make you immuhat you might assist me. My eyes—do you look at my eyes, Maud. He takes off his spectacles and brings his faine; and I flinch, as once before, from the sight of his soft and naked face—yet see now, too, what the coloured lenses hide: a certain film, or milkiness, upon the surface of his eye. My eyes grow weak, he says, replag his glasses. Yht shall save my own. Your hand shall be my hand. For you e here with naked fingers, while in the ordinary world—the onplace world, outside this chamber—the men who hariol and arsenic must do so with their flesh guarded. You are not like them. This is your proper sphere. I have made it so. I have fed you poison, by scruple and grain. Now es the larger dose.

    He turns and takes a book from his shelves, then hands it to me, pressing my fingers hard about it.

    Keep this from others. Remember the rareness of our work. It will seem queer, to the eyes and ears of the untutored. They will think you tainted, should you tell. You uand me? I have touched your lip with poison, Maud. Remember.

    The book is called The Curtain Drawn Up, or the Education of Laura. I sit alone, and turn the cover; and uand at last the matter I have read, that has provoked applause from gentlemen.

    The world calls it pleasure. My uncle collects it—keeps it , keeps it ordered, on guarded shelves; but keeps it strangely—not for its own sake, no, never for that; rather, as it provides fuel for the satisfying of a curious lust.

    I mean, the lust of the bookman.

    See here, Maud, he will say to me softly, drawing back the glass doors of his presses, passing his fingers across the covers of the texts he has exposed. Do you he marbling upon these papers, the morocco of this spihe gilt edge? Observe this tooling, look. He

    tilts the book to me but, jealously, will not let me take it. Not yet not yet! Ah, see this one, also. Black-letter; the titles, look, picked out ihe capitals flowered, the margin as broad as the text. What extravagance! And this! Plain board; but see here, the frontispiece— the picture is of a lady reed on a couch, a gentleman beside her, his member bare and crimson at the tip—doer Borel, most rare. I had this as a young man from a stall at Liverpool, for a shilling. I should not part with it now, for fifty pounds.—e, e! He has seen me blush. No schoolgirl modesty here! Did I bring you to my house, and teach you the ways of my colle, to see you colour? Well, no more of that. Here is work, not leisure. You will soon fet the substance, in the scrutiny of the form.

    So he says to me, many times. I do not believe him. I am thirteen. The books fill me, at first, with a kind of horror: for it seems a frightful thing, that children, in being women and men, should do as they describe—get lusts, grow secret limbs and cavities, be proo fevers, to crises, seek nothing but the endless joining together of smarting flesh. I imagine my mouth, stopped up with kisses. I imagihe parting of my legs. I imagine myself fingered and pierced ... I am thirteen, as I have said. The fear gives way to restlessness: I begin to lie eaight at Barbaras side, wakeful while she sleeps on; oime I put back the blao study the curve of her breast. Then I take to watg her as she bathes and dresses. Her legs—that I know from my uncles books should be smooth—are dark with hair; the place between them—which I know should be , and fair—darkest of all. That troubles me. Then at last, one day, she catches me gazing. What are you looking at? she says. Your t, I answer. Why is it so black? She starts away from me as if in horror, lets her skirt fall, puts her hands before her breast. Her cheek flares crimson. Oh! she cries. I never did! Where did you learn such words? From my uncle, I say.

    Oh, you liar! Your uncles a gentleman. Ill tell Mrs Stiles! She does. I think Mrs Stiles will hit me; instead, like Barbara, she starts back. But then, she takes up a block of soap and, while

    Barbara holds me, she presses the soap into my mouth—presses it hard, then passes it bad forth ay lips and tongue.

    Speak like a devil, will you? she says as she does it. Like a slut and a filthy beast? Like your own trash mother? Will you? Will

    you?

    Thes me fall, and stands and wipes her hands vulsively upon her apron. She has Barbara keep to her own bed, from that night on; and she makes her keep the door between our rooms ajar, and put out a light.

    Thank God she wears gloves, at least, I hear her say. That may keep her from further mischief ...&quot;

    I wash my mouth, until my tongue grows cracked, and bleeds; I weep and weep; but still taste lavender. I think my lip must have poison in it, after all.

    But soon, I do not care. My t grows dark as Barbaras, I uand my uncles books to be filled with falsehoods, and I despise myself for having supposed them truths. My hot cheek cools, my colour dies, the heat quite fades from my limbs. The restlessurns all to s. I bee what I was bred to be. I bee a librarian.

    The Lustful Turk, my uncle might say, looking up from his papers. Where do we have it?

    We have it here, Uncle, I will answer.—For within a year I know the place of every book upon his shelves. I know the plan of his great index—his Universal Bibliography of Priapus and Venus. For to Priapus and Venus he has devoted me, as irls are appreo the needle or the loom.

    I know his friends—those gentlemen who visit, and still hear me recite. I know them now for publishers, collectors, aueers— enthusiasts of his work. They send him books—more books each week—aers:

    &quot;Mr Lilly: on the Cleland. Grivet of Paris claims no knowledge of the lost, sodomitical matter. Shall I pursue?&quot;

    My uncle hears me read, his eyes creased hard behind their lenses.

    What think you, Maud? he says. —Well, never mind it now. We must leave the Cleland to languish, and hope for more in the spring. So, so. Let me see . . . He divides the slips of paper upon his desk. Now, The Festival of the Passions. Have we still the sed volume, on loan from Hawtrey? You must copy it, Maud ...&quot;

    I will, I say.

    You think me meek. How else should I answer? Once, early on, I fet myself, and yawn. My uudies me. He has taken his pen from his page, and slowly rolls its nib.

    It appears you find your occupation dull, he says at last. Perhaps you would like to return to your room. I say nothing. Should you like it?

    Perhaps, sir, I say, after a moment.

    Perhaps. Very good. Put back your book then, and go. But, Maud— This last, as I cross to the door. Do you instruct Mrs Stiles to keep the fuel from your fire. You dont suppose I shall pay, to keep you warm in idleness, hmm?

    I hesitate, then go. This is, again, in wi seems always wihere! I sit ed in my coat until made to dress for dinner. But at the table, when Mr Way brings the food to my plate, my uops him. , he says, laying a napkin across his lap, for idle girls. Not in this house.

    Then Mr Way takes the platter away. Charles, his boy, looks sorry. I should like to strike him. Instead I must sit, twisting my hands into the fabriy skirt, biting down my rage as I once swallowed tears, hearing the sliding of the meat upon my uncles ink-staiongue, until I am dismissed.

    day at eight oclock, I return to my work; and am careful o yawn again.

    I grow taller, in the months that follow. I bee slender and more pale. I bee handsome. I outgrow my skirts and gloves and slippers.—My ues it, vaguely, and instructs Mrs Stiles to cut me new gowns to the pattern of the old. She does, and makes me sew them. I believe she must take a sort of malicious pleasure from the dressing of me to suit his fancy; then again, perhaps in her grief for

    her daughter she has fotten that little girls are meant to turn out women. Anyway, I have been too long at Briar, and draw a fort, now, frularity. I have growo my gloves and my hard-boned gowns, and flinch at the first unloosening of the strings. Undressed, I seem to feel myself as naked and unsafe as one of my uncles lenseless eyes.

    Asleep, I am sometimes oppressed by dreams. Once I fall into a fever, and a surgeon sees me. He is a friend of my uncles and has heard me read. He fihe soft flesh beh my jaw, puts his thumbs to my cheeks, draws down my eye-lids. Are you troubled, he says, with unon thoughts? Well, we must expect that. You are an unon girl. He strokes my hand and prescribes me a medie—a single drop to be taken in a cup of water—for restlessness. Barbara puts out the mixture, while Mrs Stiles looks on.

    Then Barbara leaves me, to be married, and I am given another maid. Her name is Agnes. She is small, and slight as a bird—one of those little, little birds that men bring down with s. She has red hair and white skin marked with freckles, like paper foxed with damp. She is fifteen, i as butter. She thinks my uncle kind. She thinks me kind, at first. She reminds me of myself, as I once was. She reminds me of myself as I once was and ought still to be, and will never be again. I hate her for it. When she is clumsy, when she is slow, I hit her. That makes her clumsier. Then I hit her again. That makes her weep. Her face, behiears, keeps still its look of mine. I beat her the harder, the more I fancy the resemblance.

    So my life passes. You might suppose I would not know enough of ordinary things, to know it queer. But I read other books besides my uncles; and overhear the talk of servants, and catch their looks, and so, by that—by the curious and pitying glances of parlourmaids and grooms!—I see well enough the oddity I have bee.

    I am as worldly as the grossest rakes of fi; but have never, since I first came to my uncles house, been further than the walls of its park. I know everything. I know nothing. You must remember this, in what follows. You must remember what I ot do, what I have not seen. I ot, for example, sit a horse, or dance. I have

    never held a  in order to spend it. I have never seen a play, a railway, a mountain, or a sea.

    I have never seen London; a, I think I know it, too. I know it, from my uncles books. I know it lies upon a river—which is the same river, grown very much broader, that runs beyond his park. I like to walk beside the water, thinking of this. There is an a, overturned punt there, half rotted away—the holes in its hull a perpetual mockery, it seems to me, of my fi; but I like to sit upon it, gazing at the rushes at the waters edge. I remember the Bible story, of the child that laced in a basket and was found by the daughter of a king. I should like to find a child. I should like it, not to keep it!—but to take its pla the basket and leave it at Briar to grow up to be me. I think often of the life I would have, in London; and of who might claim me.

    That is when I am still young, and given to fancies. When I am older I do not walk by the river so much as stand at the windows of the house and gaze at where I know the water flows. I stand at my own casement, for many hours at a time. And in the yellow paint that covers the glass of the windows of my uncles library I one day, with my finger-nail, make a small and perfect crest, to which I afterwards occasionally lean and place my eye—like a curious wife at the keyhole of a et of secrets.

    But I am ihe et, and long to get out. . .

    I am seventeen when Richard Rivers es to Briar with a plot and a promise and the story of a gullible girl who  be fooled into helping me do it.

 Chapter Eight

    I have said it was my uncles , occasionally to invite  ied gentlemen to the house, to take a supper with us and, later, hear me read. He does so now.

    Make yourself onight, Maud, he says to me, as I stand in his library buttoning up my gloves. We shall have guests. Hawtrey, Huss, and another fellow, a stranger. I hope to employ him with the mounting of our pictures.

    Our pictures. There are ets, in a separate study, filled with drawers of lewd engravings, that my uncle has collected in a desultory sort of manner, along with his books. He has often spoken of taking on some man to trim and mount them, but has never found a man to match the task. One needs a quite particular character, for work of that sort.

    He catches my eye, thrusts out his lips. Hawtrey claims to have a gift for us, besides. Aion of a text we have not catalogued.

    That is great news, sir.

    Perhaps I speak drily; but my uhough a dry man himself, does not mark it. He only puts his hand to the slips of paper before him and divides the heap into two uneven piles. So, so. Let me see . . .

    May I leave you, Uncle?

    He looks up. Has the hour struck?

    It has, I believe.

    He draws out from his pocket his chiming watd holds it to his ear. The key to his library door—sewn about, at the stem, with faded velvet—swings noiselessly beside it. He says, Go on then, go on. Leave an old man to his books. Go and play, but—gently, Maud.

    Yes, Uncle.

    Now and then I wonder how he supposes I spend my hours, when not engaged by him. I think he is too used to the particular world of his books, where time passes strangely, or not at all, and imagines me an ageless child. Sometimes that is how I imagine myself—as if my short, tight gowns a sashes keep me bound, like a ese slipper, to a form I should otherwise outleap. My uncle himself—who is at this time, I suppose, not quite above fifty—I have always sidered to have been perfectly and permaly aged; as flies remain aged, yet fixed and unging, in cloudy chips of amber.

    I leave him squinting at a page of text. I walk very quietly, in soft-soled shoes. I go to my rooms, where Agnes is.

    I fi work at a piece of sewing. She sees me e, and flinches. Do you know how provoking such a flinch will seem, to a temperament like mine? I stand and watch her sew. She feels my gaze, and begins to shake. Her stitches grow long and crooked. At last I take the needle from her hand aly put the point of it against her flesh; then draw it off; then put it back; then do this, six or seven times more, until her knuckles are marked between the freckles with a rash of needle-pricks.

    There are to be gentlemeonight, I say, as I do it. One a stranger. Do you suppose he will be young, and handsome?

    I say it—idly enough—as a way of teasing. It is nothing to me. But she hears me, and colours.

    I t say, miss, she answers, blinking and turning her head; not drawing her hand away, however. Perhaps.

    You think so?

    Who knows? He might be.

    I study her harder, struck with a new idea.

    Should you like it if he was?

    Like it, miss?

    Like it, Agnes. It seems to me now, that you would. Shall I tell him the way to your room? I shant listen at the door. I shall turn the key, you will be quite private.

    Oh, miss, what nonsense!

    Is it? Here, turn your hand. She does, and I jab the needle harder. Now, say you dont like it, having a prick upon your palm!

    She takes her hand away and sucks it, and begins to cry. The sight of her tears—and of her mouth, w o of tender flesh that I have stabbed—first stirs, then troubles me; then makes me weary. I leave her weeping, and stand at my rattling window, my eyes upon the lawn that dips to the wall, the rushes, the Thames.

    Will you be quiet? I say, when her breath still catches. Look at you! Tears, fentleman! Dont you know that he wont be handsome, or even young? Dont you know, they never are?

    But of course, he is both.

    Mr Richard Rivers, my uncle says. The name seems auspicious to me. Later I will discover it to be false—as false as his rings, his smile, his manner; but now, as I stand in the drawing-room and he rises to make me his bow, why should I think to doubt him? He has fiures, eveh, and is taller than my uncle by almost a foot. His hair is brushed and has oil upon it, but is long: a curl springs from its plad tumbles across his brow. He puts a hand to it, repeatedly. His hands are slender, smooth and—but for a single finger, stained yellow by smoke—quite white.

    Miss Lilly, he says, as he bends towards me. The lock of hair falls forward, the stained hand lifts to brush it back. His voice is very low, I suppose for my uncles sake. He must have been cautioned in advance, by Mr Hawtrey.

    Mr Hawtrey is a London bookseller and publisher, and has been

    many times to Briar. He takes my hand and kisses it. Behind him es Mr Huss. He is a gentleman collector, a friend from my uncles youth. He also takes my hand, but takes it to draw me closer to him, then kisses my cheek. Dear child, he says.

    I have been several times surprised by Mr Huss upoairs. He likes to stand and watch me climb them.

    How do you do, Mr Huss? I say now, making him a curtsey.

    But it is Mr Rivers I watch. And once or twice, when I turn my face his way, I find his own eyes fixed on me, his gaze a thoughtful one. He is weighing me up. Perhaps he has not supposed I would be so handsome. Perhaps I am not so handsome as rumour has had him think. I ot tell. But, when the dinner-bell sounds and I move to my uncles side to be walked to the table, I see him hesitate; then he chooses the plaext to mine. I wish he had not. I think he will tio watch me, and I dont like to be watched, while eating. Mr Way and Charles move softly about us, filling lasses—mihat crystal cup, cut with an M. The food is set upon our plates, then the servants leave: they ay when we have pany, but returween courses. At Briar we eat, as we do everything, by the chiming of the clock. A supper of gentlemen lasts one hour and a half.

    We are served hare soup, this night; then goose, crisp at the skin, pink at the bones, and with its innards devilled and passed about the table. Mr Hawtrey takes a dainty kidney, Mr Rivers has the heart. I shake my head at the plate he offers.

    Im afraid youre not hungry, he says quietly, watg my face.

    Dont you care foose, Miss Lilly? asks Mr Hawtrey. Nor does my eldest daughter. She thinks of goslings, and grows tearful.

    I hope you catch her tears ahem, says Mr Huss. I often think I should like to see the tears of a girl made into an ink.

    An ink? Doion it to my daughters, I beg you. That I must hear their plaints, is ohing. Should they och the idea of impressing them also upon paper, and making me read them, I assure you, my life would not be worth the living.

    Tears, for ink? says my uncle, a beat behind the others. What rubbish is this?

    Girls tears, says Mr Huss.

    Quite colourless.

    I think not. Truly, sir, I think not. I fancy them delicately tinged—perhaps pink, perhaps violet.

    Perhaps, says Mr Hawtrey, as depending on the emotion that has provoked them?

    Exactly. You have hit it, Hawtrey, there. Violet tears, for a melancholy book; pink, fay. It might be sewn up, too, with hair from a girls head ...&quot; He gla me and his look ges. He puts his napkin to his mouth.

    Now, says Mr Hawtrey, I really wohat that has never been attempted. Mr Lilly? One hears barbarous stories of course, of hides and bindings

    They discuss this for a time. Mr Rivers listens but says nothing. Of course, his attention is all with me. Perhaps he will speak, I think, under cover of their talk. I hope he will. I hope he wont. I sip my wine and am suddenly weary. I have sat at suppers like this, hearing my uncles friends chase tedious points in small, tight circles, too many times. Uedly, I think of Agnes. I think of Agness mouth teasing a bead of blood from her pricked palm. My uncle clears his throat, and I blink.

    So, Rivers, he says, Hawtrey tells me he has you translating, French matter into English. Poor stuff, I suppose, if his press is involved in it.

    Poor stuff indeed, answers Mr Rivers; or I should not attempt it. It is hardly my line. One learns, in Paris, the necessary terms; but it was as a student of the fis that I was lately there. I hope to find a better application for my talents, sir, than the juring of bad English from worse French.

    Well, well. We shall see. My uncle smiles. You would like to view my pictures.

    Very mudeed.

    Well, another day will do for that. They are handsome enough, I think youll find. I care less for them than for my books, however. Youve heard, perhaps—he pauses—of my Index?

    Mr Rivers ines his head. It sounds a marvellous thing.

    Pretty marvellous—eh, Maud? But, are we modest? Do we blush?

    I know my own cheek is cool; and his is pale as dle-wax. Mr Rivers turns, searches my face with his thoughtful gaze.

    How goes the great work? asks Mr Hawtrey lightly.

    We are close, answers my uncle. We are very close. I am in sultation with finishers.

    And the length?

    A thousand pages.

    Mr Hawtrey raises his brow. If my uemper would permit it, he might whistle. He reaches for another slice of goose.

    Two hundred more then, he says, as he does it, since I spoke to you last.

    For the first volume, of course. The sed shall be greater. What think you of that, Rivers?

    Astonishing, sir.

    Has there ever been its like? An universal bibliography, and on such a theme? They say the sce is a dead one amongst Englishmen.

    Then you have raised it to life. A fantastic achievement.

    Fantastideed—more so, when one knows the degrees of obscurity in which my subject is shrouded. sider this: that the authors of the texts I collect must cloak their identity iion and anonymity. That the texts themselves are stamped with every kind of false and misleadiail as to plad date of publication and impress. Hmm? That they are burdened with obscure titles. That they must pass darkly, via secret els, or on the wings of rumour and supposition. sider those checks to the bibliographers progress. Theo me, sir, of fantastic labour! He trembles in a mirthless laughter.

    I ot ceive it, says Mr Rivers. And the Index is anised . . .?

    By title, by name, by date when we have it; and, mark this, sir: by species of pleasure. We have them tabled, most precisely

    The books?

    The pleasures! Where are we presently, Maud?

    The gentlemen turn to me. I sip my wi the Lust, I say, of Men for Beasts.

    My unods. So, so, he says. Do you see, Rivers, the assistance our bibliography will provide, to the student of the field? It will be a veritable Bible.

    The flesh made word, says Mr Hawtrey, smiling, enjoying the phrase. He catches my eye, and winks. Mr Rivers, however, is still looking early at my uncle.

    A great ambition, he says now.

    A great labour, says Mr Huss.

    Indeed, says Mr Hawtrey, turning again to me. I am afraid, Miss Lilly, your uncle tio work you very mercilessly.

    I shrug. I was bred to the task, I say, as servants are.

    Servants and young ladies, says Mr Huss, are different sorts of creatures. Have I not said so, many times? Girls eyes should not be worn out with reading, nor their small hands made hard through the gripping of pens.

    So my uncle believes, I say, showing my gloves; though it is his books he is anxious to save, of course, not my fingers.

    And what, he says now, if she labour five hours a day? I labour ten! What should we work for, if not books? Hmm? Think of Smart, and de Bury. Or think of Tinius, so dedicated a collector he killed two men for the sake of his library.

    Think of Frere Vie, who, for the sake of his, killed twelve! Mr Hawtrey shakes his head. No, no, Mr Lilly. Work your niece if you must. But drive her to violence for literatures sake, and we shall never five you.

    The gentlemen laugh.

    Well, well, says my uncle.

    I study my hand, saying nothing. My fingers show red as ruby through the glass of dark wine, my mothers initial quite invisible until I turn the crystal; thes leap out.

    There are two more courses before I might be excused, and then two more soundings of the clock to be sat through, alone, before the gentlemen join me in the drawing-room. I hear the murmur of their

    voices and wonder what, in my absehey discuss. When they e at last they are all a little pinker in the face, and their breaths are soured with smoke. Mr Hawtrey produces a package, bound in paper and string. He hands it to my uncle, who fumbles with the ings.

    So, so, he says; and then, with the book uncovered and held close to his eyes: Aha! He works his lips. Look here, Maud, look, at what the little grubbian has brought us. He shows me the volume. Now, what do you say?

    It is a on novel in a tawdry binding, but with an unfamiliar frontispiece that renders it rare. I look and, despite myself, feel the stirrings of a dry excitement. The sensation makes me queasy. I say, A very fihing for us, Uncle, without a doubt. See here, the fleuron? You see it? I see it.

    I dont believe we have sidered the possibility of such a thing. I am sure we have not. We must go back. Ahought that entry plete? We shall return to it, tomorrow. He stretches his neck. He likes the anticipation of pleasure. For now—well,<mark>9９ｌｉｂ.</mark> take yloves off, girl. Do you suppose Hawtrey brings us books to have you press gravy into the binding? Thats better. Lets hear a little of it. Do you sit, ao us. Huss, you must sit also. Rivers, mark my nieces voice, how soft and clear she reads. I coached her myself. Well, well.—You crease the spine, Maud!

    Indeed, Mr Lilly, she does not, says Mr Huss, gazing at my uncovered hands.

    I place the book upon a stand and carefully weight its pages. I turn a lamp so that its light falls bright upon the print. How long shall I read for, Uncle?

    He puts his watch against his ear. He says, Until the  ocloow, his, Rivers, and tell me if you suppose its like may be entered in any lish drawing-room!

    The book is filled, as I have said, with on enough obsities; but my uncle is right, I have been traioo well, my voice is clear and true and makes the words seem almost sweet. When I

    have finished, Mr Hawtrey claps, and Mr Husss pink face is pinker, his look rather troubled. My us with his spectacles removed, his head at an angle, his eyes screwed tight.

    Poor words enough, he says. But I have a home for you, upon my shelves. A home, and brothers, too. Tomorrow we shall see you placed there. The fleuron: I am certain we have not thought of that.—Maud, the covers are closed, and quite u?

    Yes, sir.

    He draws on his eye-glasses, w the wires about his ears. Mr Huss pours brandy. I button up my gloves, smooth creases from my skirt. I turn the lamp, and dim it. But I am scious of myself. I am scious of Mr Rivers. He has heard me read, apparently without excitement, his eyes upon the floor; but his hands are clasped and ohumb beats a little nervously upoher. Presently he rises. He says the fire is hot and scorches him. He walks a minute about the room, leaning rigidly to gaze into my uncles book-presses—now his hands are behind his back; his thumb still twitches, however. I think he knows I watch. In time he es close, catches my eye, makes a careful bow. He says, It is rather chill, so far from the fire. Shouldnt you like, Miss Lilly, to sit closer to the flames?

    I ahank you, Mr Rivers, I prefer this spot.

    You like to be cool, he says.

    I like the shadows.

    When I smile agaiakes it as a kind of invitation, lifts his coat, twitches at his trousers and sits beside me, not too close, still with his eyes upon my uncles shelves, as if distracted by the books. But when he speaks, he speaks in a murmur. He says, You see, I also like the shadows.

    Mr Huss glances once our way. Mr Hawtrey stands at the fire and lifts a glass. My uncle has settled into his chair and its wings obscure his eyes; I see only his dry mouth, puckered at the lip. The greatest phase of eros? he is saying. We have missed it, sir, by seventy years! The ical, improbable fis which pass for voluptuous literature nowadays I should be ashamed to show to the man that shoes my horse . . .

    I stifle a yawn, and Mr Rivers turns to me. I say, Five me Vf Rivers.

    He bows his head. Perhaps, you dont care for your uncles sub ject.

    He still speaks in a murmur; and I am obliged to make my own voice rather low, by way of answer. I am my uncles secretary, I say The appeal of the subject is nothing to me.

    Again he bows. Well, perhaps, he says, while my ualks on It is only curious, to see a lady left cool and unmoved, by that which is desigo provoke heat, and motion.

    But there are many ladies, I think, unmoved by that you speak of; and arent those who know the matter best, moved least? I catch his eye. I speak not from experience of the world, of course, but from my reading merely. But I should have said that—oh, even a priest would note a palling in his passion for the mysteries of his church, if put too often to the scrutiny of wafer and wine.

    He does not blink. At last he almost laughs.

    You are very uniss Lilly

    I look away. So I uand.

    Ah. Now your tone is a bitter one. Perhaps you think your education a sort of misfortune.

    On the trary. How could it be a misfortuo be wise? I ever be deceived, for instance, iter of a gentlemans attentions. I am a oisseur of all the varieties of methods by which a , gentleman might seek to pliment a lady

    He puts his white hand to his breast. Then I should be daunted indeed, he says, did I want only to pliment you.

    I was not aware that gentlemen had any other wants, than that one.

    Perhaps not in the books that you are used to. But in life—a great many; and ohat is chief.

    I supposed, I say, that that was the ohe books were written for.

    Oh, no. He smiles. His voice dips even lower. They are read for that, but written for something keener. I mean, of course, the want of—money. Every gentleman minds that. And those of us who are

    not quite so gentlemanly as we would like, mind it most of all.—I am sorry to embarrass you.

    I have coloured, or flinched. Now, rec, I say, You fet, I have beeo be quite beyond embarrassment. I am only surprised.

    Then I must take a satisfa from the knowledge that I have surprised you. He lifts his hand to his beard. It is something to me, he goes on, to have made a small impression upon the evenness and regularity of yourdays.

    He speaks so insinuatingly my cheek grows warmer still.

    What do you know, I say, of those?

    Why, only what I surmise, from my observation of the house . . .

    Now his void his face are grown bland again. I see Mr Huss tilt his head and observe him Then he calls, pointedly: What do you think, Rivers, of this?

    Of what, sir?

    Of Hawtreys champioting, now, of photography.

    Photography?

    Rivers, says Mr Hawtrey. You are a young man. I appeal to you.  there be any more perfect record of the amatory act—

    Record! says my uncle, peevishly. Dotary! The curses of the age!

    —of the amatory act, than a photograph? Mr Lilly will have it that the sce of photography runs ter to the spirit of the Paphian life. I say it is an image of life, and has this advantage over it: that it endures, where life—the Paphian life, the Paphian moment, in especial—must finish and fade.

    Doth not a book endure? asks my uncle, plug at the arm of his chair.

    It eh, so long as words do. But, in a photograph you have a thing beyond words, and beyond the mouths that speak them. A photograph will provoke heat in an Englishman, a Fren, a savage. It will outlast us all, and I provoke heat in randsons. It is a thing apart from history.1

    It is gripp<var></var>ed by history! answers  my u is corrupted by it! Its history hangs about it like so much smoke!—you may see it, in

    the fitting of a slipper, a gown, the dressing of a head. Give photographs to yrandson: he will study them and think them quaint. He will laugh at the wax tips of your moustaches! But words Hawtrey, words—hmm? They seduce us in darkness, and the mind clothes and fleshes them to fashions of its own. Dont you think so Rivers?

    I do, sir.

    You know I wont allow daguerreotypes and nonsense like that into my colle?

    I think you are right not to, sir.

    Mr Hawtrey shakes his head. He says, to my uncle: You still believe photography a fashion, that will pass? You must e to Holywell Street, and spend an hour in my shop. We have albums made up, now, for men to choose from. It is all our buyers e for.

    Your buyers are brutes. What business have I with them? Rivers, you have seen them. What is your opinion as to the quality of Hawtreys trade . . .?

    The debate will go on, he ot escape. He answers, then catches my eye as if in apology, rises, goes to my uncles side. They talk until the striking of ten oclock—which is when I leave them.

    That is the Thursday night. Mr Rivers is due to remain at Briar until Sunday.  day I am kept from the library while the men look over the books; at supper he watches me, and afterwards hears me read, but then is obliged to sit again with my uncle and ot e to my side. Saturday I walk in the park with Agnes, and do not see him; Saturday night, however, my uncle has me read from an antique book, one of his fi—and then, when I have finished, Mr Rivers es and sits beside me, to study its singular covers.

    You like it, Rivers? asks my uncle as he does so. You know it is very rare?

    I should say it must be, sir.

    And you think I mean by that, that there are few other copies?

    I had supposed that, yes.

    So you might. But we collectors, we gauge rarity by other means. You think a uem rare, if no-one wants it? We call that a dead

    book. But, say a score of identical copies are sought by a thousand men: each of those single books is rarer than the unique one. You uand me?

    Mr Rivers nods. I do. The rareness of the article is relative to the desire of the heart which se<u>.</u>eks it. He gla me. That is very quaint. And how many mehis book, that we have just heard?

    My uncle grows coy. How many indeed, sir? Ill answer you like this: put it up for au, and see! Ha?

    Mr Rivers laughs. To be sure, yes . . .

    But beyond the film of his politeness, he looks thoughtful. He bites his lip)—his teeth showing yellow, wolfish, against the dark of his beard, but his mouth a soft and surprising pink. He says nothing while my uncle sips at his drink and Mr Hawtrey fusses with the fire. Then he speaks again.

    And what of a pair of books, Mr Lilly, he says, sought by a single buyer? How are they to be valued?

    A pair? My us down his glass. A set, of two volumes?

    A pair of plementary titles. A man has one, and seeks to secure the other. The sed will greatly add to the value of the first?

    Of course, sir!

    I thought it.

    Men pay absurdly for such things, says Mr Huss.

    They do, says my uhey do. You will find a refereo such matters, of course, in my Index ...&quot;

    The Index, says Mr Rivers softly; and the others talk o and listen—or pretend to—and soourns and studies my face. May I ask you something, Miss Lilly? he says. And then, when I nod: What do you see, for yourself, after the pletion of your uncles work?—Now, why do you do that?

    I have given him what I suppose must be a bitter sort of smile. I say, Your question means nothing, I  hardly a. My uncles work will never be fihere are too many new books written that must be added to the old; too many lost books to be rediscovered; too mucertainty. He and Mr Hawtrey will

    debate it for ever. Look at them now. Should he publish the Index as he intends, he will only at once begin its supplements.

    You mean to keep beside him, then, for all that time?—I will not answer.—You are as dedicated as he?

    I have no choice, I say at last. My skills are few and, as you have already noted, quite unon.

    You are a lady, he says softly, and young, and handsome.—I dont speak from gallantry now, you know that. I say only what is true. You might do anything.

    You are a man, I answer. Mens truths are different from ladies. I may do nothing, I assure you.

    He hesitates—perhaps, catches his breath. Then: You might— marry, he says. That is something.

    He says it, with his eyes upon the book that I have read from; and I hear him, and laugh aloud. My uncle, supposing I have laughed at some parched joke of his, looks over and nods. You think so, Maud? You see, Huss, even my niece believes it so . . .

    I wait until his face is turned from me again, his attention captured. Then I reach for the book on its stand aly lift its cover. Look here, Mr Rivers, I say. This is my uncles plate, that is attached to all his books. Do you see the device of it?

    The plate bears his emblem, a clever thing of his own design—a lily, drawn strangely, to resemble a phallus; and wound about with a stem of briar at the root. Mr Rivers tilts his head to study it, and nods. I let the cover close.

    Sometimes, I say, not looking up, I suppose such a plate must be pasted upon my owhat I have been ticketed, and noted and shelved—so nearly do I resemble one of my uncles books. I raise my eyes to his. My face is warm, but I am speaking coolly, still. You said, two nights ago, that you have studied the ways of this house. Surely, then, you have uood. We are not meant for on usage, my fellow books and I. My uncle keeps us separate from the world. He will call us poisons; he says we will hurt unguarded eyes. Then again, he names us his children, his foundlings, that have e to him, from every er of the world—some rid handsomely provided for, some shabby, some

    injured, some broken about the spine, some gaudy, some gross. For all that he speaks against them, I believe he likes the gross ones best; for they are the ohat other parents—other bookmen and collectors, I mean—cast out. I was like them, and had a home, and lost it—

    Now I do not speak coolly. I have beeaken by my own words. Mr Rivers watches, then leans to take my uncles book very gently from its stand.

    Your home, he murmurs, as his faes close to mihe madhouse. Do you think very often of your time there? Do you think of your mother, and feel her madness in you?—Mr Lilly, your book. My uncle has looked over. Do you mind my handling it? Wont you show me, sir, the features that mark it as rare . . .?

    He has spoken very swiftly; and has startled me, horribly. I dont like to be startled. I dont like to lose my place. But now, as he rises aurns, with the book, to the fire, a sed or two passes that I ot at for. I discover at last that I have put my hand to my breast. That I am breathing quickly. That the shadows in which I sit are all at once dehan before—so dense, my skirt seems bleeding into the fabric of the sofa and my hand, rising and falling above my heart, is pale as a leaf upon a swelling pool of darkness.

    I will not swoon. Only girls in books do that, for the venience of gentlemen. But I suppose I whiten and look strange, for when Mr Hawtrey gazes my way, smiling, his smile quite falls. Miss Lilly! he says. He es and takes my hand.

    Mr Huss es also. Dear child, what is it? He holds me close, about the armpit.

    Mr Rivers hangs back. My uncle looks peevish. Well, well, he says. What now? He shuts his book, but keeps his finger, carefully, between the pages.

    They ring fnes. She es, blinking at the gentlemen, curtseying at my uncle, a look of terror on her face. It is not yet ten oclock. I am perfectly well, I say. You must not trouble. I am only tired, suddenly. I am sorry.

    Sorry? Pooh! says Mr Hawtrey. It is we who should be sorry. Mr Lilly, you are a tyrant, and overtask your nieiserably.

    I always said it, and here is the proof. Agake your mistresss arm. Go steadily, now.

    Shall you mahe stairs? Mr Huss asks anxiously. He stands in the hall as we prepare to mount them. Behind him I see Mr Rivers; but I do not catch his eye.

    When the drawing-room door is closed I push Agnes away, and in my own room I look about me for some cool thing to put upon my face. I finally go to the mantel, and lean my cheek against the looking-glass.

    Your skirts, miss! says Agnes. She draws them from the fire.

    I feel queer, dislocated. The house clock has not chimed. When it sounds, I will feel better. I will not think of Mr Rivers—of what he must know of me, how he might know it, what he means by seeki. Agands awkwardly, half-crouched, my skirts still gathered in her hands.

    The clock strikes. I step back, the her undress me. My heart beats a little smoother. She puts me in my bed, unlooses the curtains—now the night might be any night, any at all. I hear her in her own room, unfastening her gown: if I lift my head and look through the gap in my curtains I will see her upon her knees with her eyes hard shut, her hands pressed together like a childs, her lips moving. She prays every night to be taken home; and for safety as she slumbers.

    While she does it, I unlock my little wooden box and whisper cruel words to my mothers portrait. I y eyes. I think, / shall not study your face!—but, once having thought it, I know I must do it or lie sleepless and grow ill. I look hard into her pale eyes. Do you think of your mother, he said, and feel her madness in you?

    Do I?

    I put the portrait away, and call f me a tumbler of water. I take a drop of my old medie—then, uhat that will calm me, I take ahen I lie still, my hair put back. My hands, iheir gloves, begin to tingle. Agands and waits. Her own hair is let down—coarse hair, red hair, coarser and redder than ever against the fine white stuff of her nightdress. One slender collar-bone is marked a delicate blue with what is

    perhaps only a shadow, but might—I ot remember—be a bruise.

    I feel the drops at last, sour in my stomach.

    Thats all, I say. Go on.

    I hear her climb into her bed, draw up her blas. There is a silence. After a little time there es a creak, a whisper, the faint groan of maery: my uncles clock, shifting its gears. I lie and wait for sleep. It does not e. Instead, my limbs grow restless and begin to twitch. I feel, too hard, my blood—I feel the bafflement of it, at the dead points of my fingers and my toes. I raise my head, call softly: Agnes! She does not hear; or hears, but fears to answer. Agnes!—At last, the sound of my own voinerves me. I give it up, lie still. The clock groans again, then strikes. Then e other sounds, far-off. My uncle keeps early hours. Closing doors, lowered voices, shoes upoairs: the gentlemen are leaving the drawing-room and going each to their separate chambers.

    Perhaps I sleep, then—but if I do, it is only for a moment. For suddenly I give a start, and am wide awake; and I know that what has roused me is not sound, but movement. Movement, and light. Beyond the bed-curtain the rush-lamps wick has flared suddenly bright, and the doors and the window-glasses are straining against their frames.

    The house has opes mouth, and is breathing.

    Then I know that, after all, this night is not like any other. As if summoo it by a calling voice, I rise. I stand at the doorway to Agness room until I am sure, from the evenness of her breaths, that she is sleeping; then I take up my lamp and go, on naked feet, to my drawing-room. I go to the window and stand at the glass, cup my hands against their own feeble refle, peer through the darkness at the sweep of gravel, the edge of lawn, that I know lie below. For a time I see nothing. Then I hear the soft fall of a shoe, and then another, still softer. Then es the single noiseless flaring of a match between slender fingers; and a face, made hollow-eyed and garish as it tilts towards the flame.

    Richard Rivers keeps restless as I; and walks upon the lawns of Briar, perhaps hoping for sleep.

    Cold weather for walking. About the tip of his cigarette, his breath shows whiter than the smoke of his tobacco. He gathers his collar about his throat. Then he looks up. He seems to know what he will see. He does not nod, or make aure; only holds my gaze. The cigarette fades, glows bright, fades again. His stance grows more deliberate.

    He moves his head; and all at once I uand what he is doing. He is surveying the face of the house. He is ting the windows.

    He is calculating his way to my room!—and when he is certain of his route he lets his cigarette fall and crushes the glowing point of it beh his heel. He es back across the gravel-walk and someone—Mr Way, I suppose—admits him. I ot see that. I only hear the front door opehe movement of the air. Again my lamp flares, and the window-glass bulges. This time, however, the house seems holding its breath.

    I step back with my hands before my mouth, my eyes on my own soft face: it has started bato the darkness beyond the glass, and seems to swim, or hang, in space. I think, He wont do it! He dare not do it! Then I think: He will. I go to the door and put my ear against the wood. I hear a voice, and then a tread. The tread grows soft, another door closes—of course, he will wait for Mr Way to go to his bed. He will wait for that.

    I take up my lamp and go quickly, quickly: the shade throws crests of light upon the walls. I have not time to dress—ot dress, without Ago help me—but know I must not see him in my nightgown. I find stogs, garters, slippers, a cloak. My hair, that is loose, I try to fasten; but I am clumsy with the pins, and my gloves—and the medie I have swallowed—make me clumsier. I grow afraid. My heart beats quick again, but now it beats against the drops, it is like a vessel beating hard against the pull of a sluggish river. I put my hand to it, ahe yielding of my breast—unlaced, it feels; unguarded, unsafe.

    But the tug of the drops is greater than the resistany fear.

    That is the point of them, after all. For restlessness. When at leng<big></big>th he es, tapping at my door with his fingernail, I think I seem calm to him. I say at once, You know my maid is very close— asleep, but close. One cry will wake her. He bows and says nothing.

    Do I suppose he will try to kiss me? He does not do that. He only es very stealthily into the room and gazes about him in the same cool, thoughtful way in which I saw him take his measure of the house. He says, Let us keep from the window, the light shows plainly from the lawn. Then, nodding to the inner door: Is that where she lies? She wont hear us? You are sure?

    Do I think he will embrace me? He never oeps close. But I feel the cool of the night, still ging to his coat. I smell the tobac his hair, his whiskers, his mouth. I do not remember him so tall. I move to one side of the sofa and stand tensely, gripping the back of it. He keeps at the other, leans into the space between us, and speaks in whispers.

    He says, Five me, Miss Lilly. This is not how I would have met you. But I have e to Briar, after so much careful labour; and tomorrow I may be obliged to leave without seeing you. You uand me. I make no judgement on your receiving me like this. If yirl stirs, you are to say that you were wakeful; that I found out your room and came, without invitation. Ive been guilty of as much, in other mens houses.—Its as well you know at once, what manner of fellow I am. But here, Miss Lilly, tonight, I mean you no sort of harm. I think you do uand me? I think you did wish me to e?

    I say, I uand that you have found out something you think perhaps a secret: that my mother was a lunatic; that my uncle had me from a ward of the place she died in. But that is , anyone might know it; the very servants here know it. I am forbidden tet it. I am sorry for you, if you meant to profit by it.

    I am sorry, he says, to have been obliged to remind you of it again. It means nothing to me, except as it has led to your ing to Briar and bei by your uncle in such a curious way. It is he, I think, who has profited from your mothers misfortune.—Youll five my speaking plainly. I am a sort of villain, and know other

    villai. Your uncle is the worst kind, for he keeps to his own house, where his villainy passes as an old mans quirk. Dont tell me you love him, he adds quickly, seeing my face, for manners sake. I know you are above them. That is why I have e like this. We make our own manners, you and I; or take the ohat suit us. But for now, will you sit a me speak with you, as a gentleman to a lady?

    He gestures and, after a sed—as if we might be awaiting the maid and the tea-tray—we take our places on the sofa. My dark cloak gapes and shows my nightgowurns his eyes while I draw close the folds.

    Now, to tell you what I know, he says.

    I know you gain nothing unless you marry. I first had it from Hawtrey. They speak about you—perhaps you know—in the shady bookshops and publishers houses of London and Paris. They speak about you, as of some fabulous creature: the handsome girl at Briar, whom Lilly has trained, like a chattering moo recite voluptuous texts fentlemen—perhaps to do worse. I  tell you all they say, I suppose you  guess it. Thats nothing to me. He holds my gaze, then looks away. Hawtrey, at least, is a little kinder; and thinks me ho, which is more to our point. He told me, in a pitying sort of way, a little of your life—your unfortuher— your expectations, the ditions attached. Well, one hears of such girls, when one is a bachelor; perhaps not one in a hundred is worth the pursuit. . . But Hawtrey was right. I have made enquiries into your mothers fortune, and you are worth—well, do you know what you are worth, Miss Lilly?

    I hesitate, then shake my head. He he figure. It is several huimes the value of the costliest book upon my uncles shelves; and many thousand times the price of the cheapest. This is the only measure of value I know.

    It is a great sum, says Mr Rivers, watg my face.

    I nod.

    It shall be ours, he says, if we marry

    I say nothing.

    Let me be ho, he goes on. I came to Briar, meaning to get

    you in the ordinary way—I mean, seduce you from your uncles house, secure your fortune, perhaps dispose of you after. I saw in ten minutes what your life has made of you, and knew I should never achieve it. More, I uood that to seduce you would be to insult you—to make you only a different kind of captive. I dont wish to do that. I wish rather to free you.

    You are very gallant, I say. Suppose I dont care to be freed?

    He answers simply: I think you long for it.

    Then I turn my face—afraid that the beating of blood, ay cheek, will betray me to him. My voice I make steady. I say, You fet, my longings t for nothing here. As well might my uncles books long to leap from their presses. He has made me like them—

    Yes, yes, he says, in impatience. You have said as mue already. I think perhaps you say it often. But, what  such a phrase mean? You are seventeen. I am twe, and believed for many years I should be riow, and idle. Instead I am what you see me: a sdrel, not too poor in pocket, but nor too easy in it that I shant be scrambling to li for a little time to e. Do you think yourself weary? Think how weary am I! I have done many gross deeds, and thought eae the last. Believe me: I have some knowledge of the time that may be misspent, ging to fis and supposing them truths.

    He has lifted his hand to his head, and now puts back his hair from his brow; and his pallor, and the dark about his eye, seem suddenly to age him. His collar is soft, and creased from the grip of his ie. His beard has a sirand of grey. His throat bulges queerly, as mens throats do: as if inviting the blow that will crush it.

    I say, This is madness. I think you are mad—to e here, to fess yourself a villain, to suppose me willing to receive you.

    A you have received me. You receive me still. You have not called for your maid.

    You intrigue me. You have seen for yourself, the evenness of my days here.

    You seek a distra from those? Why not give them up, for ever? So you shall—like that, in a moment! gone!—when you marry me.

    I shake my head. I think you ot be serious.

    I am, however.

    You know my age. You know my uncle would never permit you to take me.

    He shrugs, speaks lightly. We shall resort, of course, to devious methods.

    You wish to make a villain of me, too?

    He nods. I do. But then, I think you are half a villain already.— Dont look like that. Dont suppose I am joking. You dont know all. He has grown serious. I am  you something very great and strange. Not the onplace subje of a wife to a husband— that servitude, to lawful ravishment and theft, that the world terms wedlock. I shant ask you for that, that is not what I mean. I am speaking, rather, of liberty. A liberty of a kind not often grao the members of your sex.

    Yet to be achieved—I almost laugh—by a marriage?

    To be achieved by a ceremony of marriage, performed under certain unusual ditions. Again he smooths his hair, and swallows; and I see at last that he is nervous—more nervous than I. He leans closer. He says, I suppose youre not squeamish, or soft about the heart, as anirl might be? I suppose your maid is really sleeping, and not listening at the door?

    I think of Agnes, of Agness bruises; but say nothing, only watch him. He passes his hand across his mouth.

    God help me, Miss Lilly, if I have misjudged you! he says. Now, listen.

    This is his plan. He means t a girl to Briar, from London, and install her as my maid. He means to use her, the her. He says he has a girl in mind, a girl of my years and c. A sort of thief—not over-scrupulous, not too clever in her ways, he says; he thinks he will secure her with the promise of some slight share in the fortune—Say, two or three thousand. I dont believe shell have the ambition to ask for more. Her set are a small set, as crooks go; though, like crooks everywhere, think themselves grander. He shrugs. The sum means nothing, after all: for he will agree to whatever she asks for; and she will not see a shilling of it. She will

    suppose me an i, and believe herself assisting in my sedu. She will persuade me, first, inte with him, then into a—he hesitates, before admitting the word—a madhouse. But, there she will take my place. She will protest—he hopes she will!—for the more she does, the more the madhouse keepers will read it as a form of lunacy; and so keep her the closer.

    And with her, Miss Lilly, he says finally, they keep close your name, your history as your mothers daughter, your uncles niece— in short, all that marks you as yourself. Think of it! They will pluck from your shoulders the weight of your life, as a servant would lift free your cloak; and you shall make your naked, invisible way to any part of the world you choose—to any new life—and there re-clothe yourself to suit your fancy.

    This is the liberty—the rare and sinister liberty—he has e to Briar to offer. For payment he wants my trust, my promise, my future silence; and one half of my fortune.

    When he has finished I sit not speaking, my face turned from his, for almost a minute. What I say at last is:

    We should never achieve it.

    He answers at once: I think we will.

    The girl would suspect us.

    She will be distracted by the plot into which I shall draw her. She will be like everyone, putting ohings she sees the strus she expects to find there. She will look at you, here, knowing nothing of your uncle—who wouldnt, in her place, believe you i?

    And her people, the thieves: shant they look for her?

    They shall look—as a thousand thieves look every day for the friends who have cheated and robbed them; and, finding nothing, theyll suppose her flown, and curse her for a while, and then fet her.

    Fet her? Are you sure? Has she no—no mother?

    He shrugs. A sort of mother. A guardian, an aunt. She loses children all the time. I dont think she will trouble very hard over one child more. Especially if she supposes—as I mean that she

    will—that the child has turned out swindler. Do you see? Her owation will help to bury her. Crooked girls t expect to be cared for, like ho ones. He pauses. They will watch her more closely, however, in the place well put her.

    I gaze away from him. A madhouse . . .

    I am sorry for that, he says quickly. But your owation— your own mothers reputation—will work for us there, just as our crooked girls will. You must see how it will. You have been held in thrall to it, all these years. Here is your ce to profit by it, ohen be free of it, for ever.

    I still look away. Again, I am afraid he will see how deeply his words have stirred me. I am almost afraid of how deeply they stir me, myself. I say, You speak as though my freedom were something to you. Its the money you care for.

    Ive admitted as much, have I not? But then, your freedom and my money are the same. That will be your safeguard, your insurance, until our fortune is secure. You may trust yourself, till then, not to my honour—for I have , say, to my cupidity; which is anyway a greater thing than honour, in the world outside these walls. You will find that out. I might teach you how to profit from it. We  take some house, in London, as man and wife.—Live separately, of course, he adds, with a smile, when the door of the house is closed .. . Ononey is got, however, your future will be your own; you must only be silent, then, as to the manner in which you got it. You uand me? Being onitted to this thing, we must be true to each other, or founder. I dont speak lightly. I dont wish to mislead you as to the nature of the business Im proposing. Perhaps your uncles care has kept you from a knowledge of the law ...&quot;

    My uncles care, I say, has made me ready to sider any strategy that will relieve me of the burden of it. But—

    He waits and, when I add nothing, says, Well, I dont expect to hear you give me your decision now. Its my aim that your uncle will keep me here, to work on his pictures—I am to view them tomorrow. If he does not, then we shall anyway be obliged to resider. But there are ways about that, as about everything.

    He passes his hand again before his eyes, and again looks older.

    The clock has struck the twelve, the fire has died an hour before, and the room is terribly chill. I feel it, all at once. He sees me shiver. I think he reads it as fear, or doubt. He leans, and at last takes my hand in his. He says, Miss Lilly, you say your freedom is nothing to me; but how could I see the life that is yours—how could any ho man see you kept down, made a slave to lewdness, leered at and insulted by fellows like Huss—and not wish to free you of it? Think of what I have proposed. Then think of your choices. You may wait for another suitor: shall you find one, among the gentlemen your uncles work brings here? And, if you do, shall he be as scrupulous as I, in the handling of your fortune?—of your person? Or, say you wait for your uo die, and find a liberty that way; meantime, his eyes have faded, his limbs have a tremor, he has worked you the harder as he has felt his powers fail. By then you are—what age? Say thirty-five, or forty. You have given your youth to the curating of books, of a kind that Hawtrey sells, for a shilling, to drapers boys and clerks. Your fortus untouched in the vault of a bank. Your solation is to be mistress of Briar—where the clock strikes off the hollow half-hours of all the life that is left to you, one by one.

    As he speaks, I look not at his face; but at my own foot in its slipper. I think again of the vision I have sometimes had—of myself, as a limb bound tight to a form it longs to outgrow. With the drops ihe vision is fiercer, I see the limb made crooked, the flesh sour and grow dense. I sit quite still, then raise my eyes to his. He is watg me, waiting to know if he has won me. He has. Not by what he has told me, about my future at Briar—for he has said nothing that I have not, long ago, already cluded for myself; but by the fact that he is here, telling it at all—that he has plotted, and travelled, forty miles—that he has stolen his way to the heart of the sleeping house, to my dark room, to me.

    Of the girl in London—who, ihan a month, he will persuade to her doom by a similar method; and to whom, a little later, with tears on my cheek, I will repeat his own arguments—I think nothing, nothing at all.

    I say, Tomorrow, when you are shown my uncles pictures: praise the Romano, though the Caracci is more rare. Praise Morland over Rowlandsohinks Rowlandson a hack.

    That is all I say. It is enough, I suppose. He holds my gaze, nods, does not smile—I think he knows I should not like to see him smile, at such a moment. He looses his grip about my fingers and theands, straightening his coat. That breaks the spell of our spiraow he is large, dark, out of place. I hope he will leave. Again I shiver and, seeing that, he says, Im afraid Ive kept you very late. You must be cold, and tired.

    He watches. Perhaps he is gauging my strength and beginning to grow doubtful. I shiver harder. He says, You woroubled— too troubled—by all Ive said?

    I shake my head. But I am afraid to rise from the sofa, in case I tremble upon my legs ao him weak. I say, Will you go?

    You are sure?

    Quite sure. I shall do better if you leave me.

    Of course.

    He would like to say more. I turn my fad will not let him, and in time hear his careful tread upon the carpet, the gentle opening and closing of the door. I sit a moment, then lift my feet, tuck the skirts of my cloak about my legs, raise my hood, lie with my head upon the hard and dusty sofa cushion.

    This is not my bed, and the hour for bed has sounded and passed, and there are none of the things—my mothers portrait, my box, my maid—about me, that I like to have close while I lie sleeping. But tonight, all things are out of their order, all my patterns have been disturbed. My liberty bes: gaugeless, fearful, iable as death.

    I sleep, and dream I am moving, swiftly, in a high-prowed boat, upon a dark and silent water.

 Chapter Nine

    I suppose that even then—or rather, especially then, when our pact is so new, so unproved, its threads still slender and weak—I suppose that even then I might draw back, unloose myself from the tugging of his ambition. I believe I wake thinking I will; for the room—the room in which, in whispers, at the hush of midnight, he took my hand, unfolded his dangerous plan, like a man putting back the rustling ers about a poison—the room reassembles itself in the chill half-hour of dawn into all its rigid familiar lines. I lie and watch it. I know every curve and angle. I know them, too well. I remember weeping, as a girl of eleven, at the strangeness of Briar—at the silehe stillness, the turning passages and cluttered walls. I supposed then that those things would be strao me for ever, I felt their strangeness make me strange— make me a thing of points and hooks, a burr, a splinter in the gullet of the house. But Briar crept on me. Briar absorbed me. Now I feel the simple weight of the woollen cloak with which I have covered

    myself and think, / shall never escape! I am not meant to escape! Briar will never let me!

    But, I am wrong. Richard Rivers has e into Briar like a spore of yeast into dough, ging it utterly. When I go, at eight oclock, to the library, I am sent away: he is there with my uncle, looking over the prints. They pass three hours together. And when, iernoon, I am summoned downstairs to make my farewells to the gentlemen, it is only Mr Hawtrey and Mr Huss that I must give my hand to. I find them in the hall, fastening their greatcoats, drawing on their gloves, while my uncle leans upon his e and Richard stands, a little way off, his hands in his pockets, looking on. He sees me first. He meets my gaze, but makes ure. Thehers hear my step and lift their heads to watch me. Mr Hawtrey smiles.

    Here es fair Galatea, he says.

    Mr Huss has put on his hat. Now he takes it off. The nymph, he asks, his eyes on my face, or the statue?

    Well, both, Mr Hawtrey says; but I meant the statue. Miss Lilly shoale, dont you think? He takes my hand. How my daughters would envy you! They eat clay, you know, to whiten their plexions? Pure clay He shakes his head. I do think the fashion for pallor a most uhy one. As for you, Miss Lilly, I am struck again—as I always am, when I must leave you!—by the unfairness of your uncle keeping you here in such a miserable, mushroom-like way.

    I am quite used to it, I say quietly. Besides, I think the gloom makes me show paler than I am. Does Mr Rivers not go with you?

    The gloom is the culprit. Really, Mr Lilly, I  barely make out the buttons on my coat. Do you mean o join civilised society, and bring gas to Briar?

    Not while I keep books, says my uncle.

    Say hen. Rivers, gas poisons books. Did you know?

    I did not, says Richard. Theurns to me, and adds, in a lower voio, Miss Lilly, I am not to go up to London just yet. Your uncle has been kind enough to offer me a little work among his prints. We share a passion, it seems, for Morland.

    His eye is dark—if a blue eye  be dark. Mr Hawtrey says,

    Now Mr Lilly, hows this for an idea: What say, while the mounting of the prints is in progress, you let your niece make a visit to Holywell Street? Shouldnt you like a holiday, Miss Lilly, in London? There, I see by your look that you should.

    She should not, says my uncle.

    Mr Huss draws close. His coat is thid he is sweating. He takes the tips of my fingers. Miss Lilly, he says. If I might ever—

    e e, says my uncle. Now you grow tedious. Heres my an, look. Maud, do you step back from the door ...&quot;

    Fools, he says, when the gentlemen have gone. Eh, Rivers? But e, Im impatient to begin. You have your tools?

    I  fetch them, sir, in a moment.

    He bows, and goes. My uncle makes to follow. Theurns, to look at me. He looks, in a sidering sort of way, then bee clive me your hand, Maud, he says. I think he means to have me support him oairs. But when I offer him my arm he takes it, holds it, raises my wrist to his face, draws back the sleeve and squints at the strip of skin exposed. He peers at my cheek. Pale, do they say? Pale as mushroom? Hmm? He works his mouth. You know what kind of matter mushrooms spring from?—Ho! He laughs. Not pale, now!

    I have coloured and drawn away. Still laughing, he lets fall my hand, turns from me, begins to mount the stairs alone. He wears a pair of soft list slippers, that show his stoged heels; and I watch him climb, imagining my spite a whip, a stick, with which I could lash at his feet and make him stumble.

    I am standing, thinking this, hearing his step fade, when Richard returns to the gallery from the floors above. He does not look for me, does not know that I am there, still there, in the shadow of the fastened front door. He only walks; but he walks briskly, his fingers drumming the gallery rail. I think perhaps he even whistles, or hums. We are not used to such sounds at Briar, and with my passion raised a smarting by my uncles words they strike me now as thrilling, perilous, like a shifting of timbers and beams. I think the dust must be rising in a cloud from the antique carpets beh his

    shoes; and when I raise my eyes to follow his tread I am sure I  see fine crumbs of paint flake and tumble from the ceiling. The

    sight makes me giddy. I imagihe house walls crag__

    gaping—collapsing in the cussion of his presence. I am only afraid they will do so before I have had my ce to escape.

    But I am afraid, too, of esg. I think he knows it. He ot speak privately with me, once Mr Huss and Mr Hawtrey have gone; and he does not dare to steal his way, a sed time, to my own rooms. But he knows he must secure me to his plan. He waits, and watches. He takes his supper with us, still; but sits at my uncles side, not mine. One night, however, he breaks their versation to say this:

    It troubles me, Miss Lilly, to think of how bored you must be, now I have e and taken your utention from his Index. I imagine you are longing to return to your work among the books.

    The books? I say. Theing my gaze fall to my plate of broke: Very much, of course.

    Then I wish I might do something, to make the burden of your days a little lighter. Have you no work—no painting or sketg, material of that sort—that I might mount for you, in my own time? I think you must. For I see you have many handsome prospects, from the windows of the house.

    He raises a brow, as a ductor of music might raise a baton. Of course, I am nothing if not obedient. I say, I ot paint, or draw. I have never been taught it.

    What, never?—Five me, Mr Lilly. Your rikes one as being so petent a mistress of the general run of the female arts, I should have said— But, you know, we might remedy this, with very little trouble. Miss Lilly could take lessons from me, sir. Might I not teach her, in my afternoons? I have a little experien the field: I taught drawing for all of one season at Paris, to the daughters of a te.

    My uncle screws up his eyes. Drawing? he says. What would my niece want with that? Do you mean to assist us, Maud, in the making up of the albums?

    I mean drawing for its own sake, sir, says Richard gently, before I  reply.

    For its own sake? My uncle blinks at me. Maud, what do you

    say?

    Im afraid I have no skill.

    No skill? Well, that may be true. Certainly your hand, when I first had you here, was ungainly enough; and tends to slope, even now. Tell me, Rivers: should a course of instru in drawihe firmness of my nieces hand?

    I should say it would, sir, most definitely.

    Then, Maud, do you let Mr Rivers teach you. I dont care, anyhow, to imagine you idle. Hmm?

    Yes, sir, I say.

    Richard looks on, a sheen of blandness across his gaze like the filmy lid that guards a cats eye as it slumbers. My uncle bending to his plate, however, he quickly meets my look: then the film draws back, the eye is bared; and the sudden intimacy of his expression makes me shudder.

    Dont misuand me. Dont think me more scrupulous than I am. Its true I shudder in fear—fear of his plot—fear of its success, as well as of its failure. But I tremble, too, at the boldness of him— or rather, his boldness sets me quivering, as they say a vibrating string will find out unsuspected sympathies in the fibres of idle bodies. I saw in ten minutes what your life has made of you, he said to me, that first night. And then: I think you are half a villain already. He was right. If I never khat villainy before—or if, knowing it, I never —I know it, , now.

    I know it, when he es each day to my room, raises my hand to his mouth, touches his lips to my knuckles, rolls his cold, blue, devilish eyes. If Agnes sees, she does not uand. She thinks it gallantry. It is gallantry!—The gallantry ues. She will watch while we put out paper, leads and paints. She will see him take his place at my side, guide my fingers in the making of curves and crooked lines. He will drop his voice. Mens voices do badly in murmurs, as a rule—they break, they jar, they long to rise—but his

    fall, insinuate, a, like a musiote, stay clear; and while she sits and sews, half the length of a room away, he will take me, i, point by point across his scheme, until the scheme is perfect. Very good, hell say—like a proper drawing-master with an able girl. Very good. You learn quickly

    He will smile. He will straighten and put back his hair. He will look at Agnes and find her eyes on his. Her gaze will flutter away. Well, Agnes, hell say, marking her nervousness like a hunter marks his bird, what do you say to your mistresss gifts as an artist? Oh, sir! I couldnt hope to judge.

    He might take up a pencil, go closer to her. You see how I have Miss Lilly hold the lead? Her grip is a ladys grip, however, and needs firming. I think your hand, Agnes, would bear a pencil better. Here, wont you try?

    Once he takes her fingers. She colours scarlet at his touch. Do you blush? he says then, in amazement. You dont suppose I mean to insult you? No, sir!

    Well, why do you blush?   -■ I am only a little warm, sir. Warm, in December—?

    And so on. He has a talent for torment, quite as polished as my own; and I ought, in  this, to grow cautious. I do not. The more he teases, the more bewildered Agnes bees, the more—like a top, revolving faster at the goading of a whip!—the more I taunt her myself.

    Agnes, I say, while she undresses me or brushes out my hair, what are you thinking of? Of Mr Rivers? I stop her wrist, feel the grinding of the bones i. Do you think him handsome, Agnes? You do, I see it in your eye! And dont young girls want handsome men?

    Indeed, miss, I dont know!

    Do you say that? Then youre a liar. I pinch her, in some soft part of her flesh—for of course, by now I know them all. Youre a liar and a flirt. Will you put those crimes upon your list, when you kneel beside your bed and ask your Father tive you? Do you

    think He will five you, Agnes? I think He must five a redheaded girl, for she t help it that shes wicked, its in her nature to be so. He would be cruel io put a passion in her, and then to punish her for feeling it. Dont you think? Dont you feel your passion, when Mr Rivers gazes at you? Dont you listen for the sound of his quick step?

    She says she doesnt. She swears it, against her own mothers life! God knows what she really thinks. She must only say it, or the play will founder. She must say it and be bruised, ahe habit of her innoplete; and I must bruise her. I must bruise her, for all the onplace wanting of him that—were I an ordinary girl, with an ordinary heart—I would surely feel myself.

    I never do feel it. Dont imagine I do. Does de Merteuil feel it, for Valmont? I dont want to feel it. I should hate myself, if I did! For I know it, from my uncles books, for too squalid a thing—an itch, like the itch of inflamed flesh, to be satisfied hecticly, wetly, in closets and behind ss. What he has called up in me, set stirring in my breast—that dark propinquity—is something altogether rarer. I might say, it rises like a shadow in the house, or creeps like a bloom across its walls. But the house is full of shadows and stains, already; and so no-one marks it.

    No-one, perhaps, save Mrs Stiles. For I think only she, of ahere, ever gazes at Richard and wonders if he is all the gentleman he claims to be. I catch her look, sometimes. I believe she sees through him. I believe she thinks he has e to cheat me and do me harm. But, thinking it—and hating me—she keeps the thought to herself; and nurses her hope of my ruin, smiling, as she onursed her dying child.

    These, then, are the metals with which our trap is made, the forces that prime it and sharpen its teeth. And when it is all plete— Now, says Richard, our work begins.

    We must get rid of Agnes.

    He says it in a whisper, with his eyes upon her, as she sits at the window bent over her work. He says it so coolly, with so steady a gaze, I am almost afraid of him. I think I draw back. Then he looks at me.

    You know that we must, he says.

    Of course.

    And you uand how?

    I have not, until this moment. Now I see his face.

    Its quite the only way, he goes on, with virtuous girls like that. Will stop up a mouth, better even than menaces, or s . . . He has picked up a paintbrush, puts the hairs to his lip and begins to run them, idly, bad forth. Dont trouble with the details, he says smoothly. Theres not much to it. Not much, at all— He smiles. She has looked up from her work, and he has caught her eye. How is the day, Agnes? he calls. Still fair?

    Quite fair, sir.

    Good. Very good . . . Then she must I suppose lower her head, for the kindness sinks from his face. He puts the paintbrush to his tongue and sucks the hairs into a point. Ill do it tonight, he says, thoughtfully. Shall I? I will. Ill make my way to her room, as I made my way to yours. All you must do is, give me fifteen minutes aloh her—again he looks at me—and not e, if she cries out.

    It has seemed, until this point, a sort of game. Dolemen and young ladies, in try houses, play games—flirt and intrigue? Now es the first failing, or shrinking bay heart. When Agnes undresses me that night, I ot look at her. I turn my head. You may close the door to your room, this once, I say; and I feel her hesitate—perhaps catch the weakness in my voice, grow puzzled. I do not watch her leave me. I hear the clig of the latch, the murmur of her prayers; I hear the murmur broken off, when he es to her door. She does not cry out, after all. Should I really be able to keep from going to her, if she did? I do not know. But, she does not, her voily lifts high, in surprise, in indignation and then—I suppose—a kind of panic; but then it drops, is stifled or soothed, gives way in a moment to whispers, to the rub of linen or limbs . . . Then the rub bees silence. And the silence is worst of all: not an absence of sound, but teeming—as they say clear water teems, when viewed through a lens—with kicks and squirming

    movements. I imagine her shuddering, weeping, her clothes put back—but her freckled arms closing, despite herself, about his plunging back, her white mouth seeking out his—

    I put my hands to my own mouth; ahe dry chafe of my gloves. Then I stop up my ears. I dont hear it when he leaves her. I dont know what she does when he is gone. I let the door stay closed; take drops, at last, to help me sleep; and the day, wake late. I hear her calling, weakly, from her bed. She says she is ill. She parts her lips, to show me the lining of her mouth. It is red and raised and swollen.

    Scarlet fever, she whispers, not meeting my gaze.

    There are fears, then, of iion. Fears, of that! She is moved to an attid plates of vinegar burned in her room—the smell makes me sick. I see her again, but only ohe day she es to make me her good-bye. She seems thin, and dark about the eye; and her hair is cut. I reach for her hand, and she flinches, perhaps expeg a blow; I only kiss her, lightly, on her wrist.

    Then she looks at me in s.

    You are soft on me now, she says, drawing back her arm, pulling down her sleeve, now youve ao be hard to. Good luck to y. Id like to see you bruise him, before he bruises you.

    Her words shake me a little—but only a little; and when she is go seems to me that I fet her. For Richard is also gone— gohree days before, on my uncles business, and on ours—and my thoughts are all with him, with him and with London. London! where I have never been, but which I have imagined so fiercely, so often, I am sure I know. London, where I will find my liberty, cast off my self, live to another pattern—live without patterns, without hides and bindings—without books! I will ban paper from my house!

    I lie upon my bed and try to imagihe house that I will take, in London. I ot do it. I see only a series of voluptuous rooms— dim rooms, close rooms, rooms-within-rooms—dungeons and cells—the rooms of Priapus and Venus.—The thought unnerves me. I give it up. The house will e clearer in time, I am sure of it.

    I rise and walk and think again of Richard, making his passage across the city, pig his way through the night to the dark thieves den, close to the river. I think of him roughly greeted by crooks, I think of him casting off his coat and hat, warming his hands at a fire, looking about him. I think of him, Macheath-like, ting off a set of vicious faces—Mrs Vixey Doxy, Jenny Diver, Molly Brazen—until he finds the face he seeks . . .

    Suky Tawdry.

    Her. I think of her. I think so hard of her I think I know her colour—fair—her figure—plump—her walk, the shade of her eye.—I am sure it is blue. I begin to dream of her. In the dreams she speaks and I hear her voice. She says my name, and laughs.

    I think I am dreaming of her when Margaret es to my room with a letter, from him.

    Shes ours, he writes.

    I read it, then fall back upon my pillow and hold the letter to my mouth. I put my lips to the paper. He might be my lover, after all—or, she might. For I could not want her now, more than I could a lover.

    But I could not want a lover, more than I want freedom.

    I put his letter upon the fire, then draw up my reply: Se once. I am sure I shall love her. She shall be the dearer to me for ing from London, where you are!—we settled on the w before he left.

    That done, I need only wait, one day and then ahe day after that is the day she es.

    She is due at Marlow at three oclock. I send William Inker for her, in good time. But though I sit ao feel her drawing close, the trap es back without her: the trains are late, there are fogs. I pace, and ot settle. At five oclock I send William again—again he es back. Then I must take supper with my uncle. While Charles pours out my wine I ask him, Any news yet, of Miss Smith?—My uncle hearing me whisper, however, he sends Charles away.

    Do you prefer to talk with servants, Maud, than with me? he says. He is peevish, since <samp></samp>Richard left us.

    He chooses a book of little punishments for me to read from, after the meal: the steady recitation of cruelty makes me calmer. But when I go up to my chill and silent rooms, I grow fretful again; and after Margaret has undressed me and put me into my bed, I rise, and walk—stand now at the fire, now at the door, now at the window, looking out for the light of the trap. Then I see it. It shows feebly in the fog—seems to glow, rather than to shine—and to flash, with the motion of the horse and the passage of the trap behind the trees, like a thing of warning. I watch it e, my hand at my heart. It draws close—slows, narrows, fades—I see beyond it, then, the horse, the cart, William, a vaguer figure. They drive to the rear of the house, and I run to Agness room—Susans room, it will be now—and stand at the window there; and finally see her.

    She is lifting her head, gazing up at the stables, the clock. William jumps from his seat and helps her to the ground. She holds a hood about her face. She is dressed darkly, and seems small.

    But, she is real. The plot is real.—I feel the force of it all at once, and tremble.

    It is too late to receive her, now. Instead I must wait further, while she is given a supper and brought to her room; and then I must lie, heariep and murmur, my eyes upon the door—an inch or two of desiccated wood!—that lies between her chamber and

    mine.

    Once I rise and go stealthily to it, and put my ear to the panels; but hear nothing.

    m I have Margaret carefully dress me, and while she pulls at my laces I say, I believe Miss Smith has e. Did you see her, Margaret?

    Yes, miss.

    Do you think she will do?

    Do, miss?

    As girl to me.

    She tosses her head. Seemed rather low in her manners, she says. Been half a dozen times to Frand I dont know where, though. Made sure Mr Inker khat.

    Well, we must be kind to her. It will seem dull to her here, perhaps, after London. She says nothing. Will you have Mrs Stiles brio me, so soon as she has taken her breakfast?

    I have lain all night, sometimes sleeping, sometimes waking, oppressed with the nearness and obscurity of her. I must see her now, before I go to my uncle, or I fear I will grow ill. At last, at half-past seven or so, I hear an unfamiliar tread in the passage that leads from the servants staircase; and then Mrs Stiless murmur: Here we are. There es a knock upon my door. How should I stand? I stand at the fire. Does my voice sound queer, when I call out? Does she mark it? Does she hold her breath? I know I hold mihen I feel myself colour, and will the blood from my face. The door is opened. Mrs Stiles es first and, after a moments hesitation, she is before me: Susan—Susan Smith—Suky Tawdry—the gullible girl, who is to take my life from me and give me freedom.

    Sharper than expectation, es dismay. I have supposed she will resemble me, I have supposed she will be handsome: but she is a small, slight, spotted thing, with hair the colour of dust. Her  es almost to a point. Her eyes are brown, darker than mine. Her gaze is now too frank, now sly: she gives me a single, searg look that takes in my gown, my gloves, my slippers, the very clocks upon my stogs. Then she blinks—remembers her training, I suppose—makes a hasty curtsey. She is pleased with the curtsey, I  tell. She is pleased with me. She thinks me a fool. The idea upsets me, more than it should. I think, You have e to Briar to ruin me. I step to take her hand. Wont you colour, or tremble, or hide your eyes? But she returns my gaze and her fingers—which are bitten, about the nails—are cold and hard and perfectly steady in mine.

    We are watched by Mrs Stiles. Her look says plainly: Here is the girl you sent for, to London. She is about good enough for you, I think.

    You need not stay, Mrs Stiles, I say. And then, as she turns to go: But you will have been kind to Miss Smith, I know. I look again at Susan. Youve heard, perhaps, that I am an orphan, Susan; like you. I came to Briar as a child—very young, and with no-o all

    to care for me. I ot tell you all the ways in which Mrs Stiles has made me know what a mothers love is, sihat time . . .

    I say this, smiling. The tormenting of my uncles housekeeper is too routine an occupation, however, to hold me. It is Susan I want; and when Mrs Stiles has twitched and coloured a us, I draw her to me, to lead her to the fire. She walks. She sits. She is warm and quick. I touch her arm. It is as slender as Agness, but hard. I  smell beer upon her breath. She speaks. Her voice is not at all how I have dreamed it, but light a; though she tries to make it sweeter. She tells me of her journey, of the train from London— when she says the word, London, she seems scious of the sound; I suppose she is not in the habit of naming it, of sidering it a place of destination or desire. It is a wonder and a torment to me that a girl so slight, so trifling as she, should have lived her life in London, while mine has been all at Briar; but a solation, also— for if she  thrive there, then might not I, with all my talents, thrive better?

    So I tell myself, while describing her duties. Again I see her eye my gown and slippers and nnising the pity in her gaze as well as the s, I think I blush. I say, Your last mistress, of course, was quite a fine lady? She would laugh, I suppose, to look at me!

    My voice is not quite steady. But if there is a bittero my tone, she does not catch it. Instead, Oh, no, miss, she says. She was far too kind a lady. And besides, she always said that grand clothes werent worth buttons; but that it was the heart ihem that ts.

    She looks so taken with this—so taken in, by her own fi—so i, not sly—I sit a moment and regard her in silehen I take her hand again. You are a good girl, Susan, I think, I say. She smiles and looks modest. Her fingers move in mine.

    Lady Alice always said so, miss, she says.

    Did she?

    Yes, miss.

    Then she remembers something. She pulls from me, reaches into her pocket, and brings out a letter. It is folded, sealed, directed in an

    affected feminine hand; and of course es from Richard. I hesitate, then take it—rise and walk, unfold it, far from her gaze.

    No names! it says;—but I think you know me. Here is the girl who will make us rich—that fresh little finger smith, Ive had cause in the past to employ her skills, and  end her. She is watg as I write this, and oh! her ignorance is perfect. I imagine her now, gazing at you. She is luckier than I, who must pass two filthy weeks before enjoying that pleasure.—Burn this, will you?

    I have thought myself as cool as he. I am not, I am not, I feel her watg—-just as he describes!—and grow fearful. I stand with the letter in my hand, then am aware all at ohat I have stood too long. If she should have seen—! I fold the paper, owice, thrice— finally it will not fold at all. I do not yet know that she ot read or write so much as her own name; when I learn it I laugh, in an awful relief. But I dont quite believe her. Not read? I say. Not a letter, not a word?—and I hand her a book. She does not want to take it; and when she does, she opens its covers, turns a page, gazes hard at a piece of text—but all in a way that is wrong, indefinably anxious and wrong, and too subtle to terfeit.—At last, she blushes.

    Then I take the book back. I am sorry, I say. But I am not sorry, I am only amazed. Not to read! It seems to me a kind of fabulous insufficy—like the absence, in a martyr or a saint, of the capacity for pain.

    The eight oclock sounds, to call me to my u the door I pause. I must, after all, make some blushing refereo Richard; and I say what I ought and her look, as it should, bees suddenly crafty and then grows clear. She tells me how kind he is. She says it—again—as if she believes it. Perhaps she does. Perhaps kindness is measured to a different standard, where she es from. I feel the points and edges of the folded note he has sent by her hand, in the pocket of my skirt.

    What she does while alone in my chambers I ot say, but I

    imagine her fingering the silks of my gowns, trying out my boots, my gloves, my sashes. Does she take an eye-glass to my jewels? Perhaps she is planning already what she will do, when they are hers: this brooch she will keep, from this she will prise the stones<dfn></dfn> to sell them, the ring of gold that was my fathers she will pass to her young man . . .

    You are distracted, Maud, my uncle says. Have you another occupation to which you would rather attend?

    No, sir, I say.

    Perhaps you begrudge me your little labour. Perhaps you wish that I had left you at the madhouse, all those years ago. Five me: I had supposed myself perf you some service, by taking you from there. But perhaps you would rather dwell among lunatics, than among books? Hmm?

    No, Uncle.

    He pauses. I think he will return to his notes. But he goes on.

    It would be a simple matter enough, to summon Mrs Stiles and have her take you back. You are sure you dont desire me to do that?—send for William Inker and the dog-cart? As he speaks, he leans to study me, his weak gaze fierce behind the spectacles that guard it. Then he pauses again, and almost smiles. What would they make of you upon the wards, I wonder, he says, in a different voice, with all that you know now?

    He says it slowly, then mumbles the question over; as if it is a biscuit that has left crumbs beh his tongue. I do not answer, but lower my gaze until he has worked his humour out. Presently he twists his ned looks again at the pages upon his desk.

    So, so. The Whipping Milliners. Read me the sed volume, with the punctuation all plete; and mark—the paging is irregular. Ill he sequence here.

    It is from this that I am reading when she es to take me bay drawing-room. She stands at the door, looking over the walls of books, the painted windows. She hovers at the pointing fihat my uncle keeps to mark the bounds of innoce at Briar, just as I once did; and—again, like me—in her innoce she does not see it,

    and tries to cross it. I must keep her from that, more even than my uncle must!—and while he jerks and screams I go softly to her, and touch her. She fli the feel of my fingers.

    I say, Dont be frightened, Susan. I show her the brass hand in the floor.

    I have fotten that, of course, she might look at anything there, anything at all, it would be so muk upon paper. Remembering, I am filled again with wonder—and then with a spiteful kind of envy. I have to draw back my hand from her ar<bdi>?</bdi>m, for fear I will pinch her.

    I ask her, as we walk to my room, What does she think of my uncle?

    She believes him posing a diary.

    We sit at lunch. I have no appetite, and pass my plate to her. I lean ba my chair, and watch as she ruhumb along the edge of a, admires the weave of the napkin she spreads on her knee. She might be an aueer, a house-agent: she holds each item of cutlery as if gauging the worth of the metal from which it is cast. She eats three eggs, spooning them quickly, ly into her mouth—not shuddering at the yielding of the yolk, not thinking, as she swallows, of the closing of her own throat about the meat. She wipes her lips with her fingers, touches her too some spot upon her knuckle; then swallows again.

    You have e to Briar, I think, to swallow up me.

    But of course, I wao do it. I need her to do it. And already I seem to feel myself beginning to give up my life. I give it up easily, as burning wicks give up smoke, to tarnish the glass that guards them; as spiders spin threads of silver, to bind up quivering moths. I imagi settling, tight, about her. She does not know it. She will not know it until, too late, she will look and see how it has clothed and ged her, made her like me. For now, she is only tired, restless, bored: I take her walking about the park, and she follows, leadenly; we sit and sew, and she yawns and rubs her eyes, gazing at nothing. She chews her fingernails—stops, when she sees me looking; then after a minute draws down a length of hair and bites the tip of that.

    You are thinking of London, I say.

    She lifts her head. London, miss?

    I nod. What do ladies do there, at this hour in the day?

    Ladies, miss?

    Ladies, like me.

    She looks about her. Then, after a sed: Make visits, miss?

    Visits?

    To other ladies?

    Ah.

    She does not know. She is making it up. I am sure she is making

    it up! Even so, I think over her words and my heart beats suddenly

    hard. Ladies, I said, like me. There are no ladies like me, however;

    and for a sed I have a clear and frightening picture of myself in

    London, alone, unvisited—

    But I am alone and unvisited, now. And I shall have Richard

    there, Richard will guide and advise me. Richard means to take us

    a house, with rooms, with doors that will fasten—

    Are you cold, miss? she says. Perhaps I have shivered. She rises,

    to fetch me a shawl. I watch her walk. Diagonally she goes, over the

    carpet—heedless of the design, the lines and diamonds and squares,

    beh her feet.

    I watd watch her. I ot look too long, too narrowly at her, in her easy doing of onplace things. At seven oclock she makes me ready for supper with my u tes me into my bed. After that, she stands in her room and I hear her sighing, and I lift my head and see her stretd droop. Her dle lights her, very plainly; though I lie hidden in the dark. Quietly she passes, bad forth across the doorway—now stooping to pick up a fallen laow taking up her cloak and brushing mud from its hem. She does not kneel and pray, as Agnes did. She sits on her bed, out of my sight, but lifts her feet: I see the toe of one shoe put to the heel of the other and work it down. Now she stands, to undo the buttons of her gown; now she lets it fall, steps awkwardly out of her skirt; unlaces her stays, rubs her waist, sighs again. Now she steps away. I lift my head, to follow. She es back, in her nightgown— shivering. I shiver, in sympathy. She yawns. I also yawn. She

    stretches—enjoying the stretch—liking the approach of slumber! Now she moves off—puts out her light, climbs into her bed—grows warm I suppose, and sleeps . . .

    She sleeps, in a sort of innoce. So did I, once. I wait a moment, then take out my mothers picture and hold it close to my mouth.

    Thats her, I whisper. Thats her. Shes your daughter now!

    How effortless it seems! But when I have locked my mothers face away I lie, uneasily. My uncles clock shudders and strikes. Some animal shrieks, like a child, in the park. I y eyes and think— what I have not thought so vividly of, in years—of the madhouse, my first home; of the wild-eyed women, the lunatics; and of the nurses. I remember all at ohe nurses rooms, the mattings of coir, a piece of text on the limewashed wall: My meat is to do the will of Him that sent me. I remember an attic stair, a walk upon the roof, the softness of lead beh my fingernail, the frightful drop to the ground—

    I must fall into sleep, thinking this. I must pluo the deepest layers of the night. But then, I am woken—or, not quite woken, not quite drawn free from the tugging of the dark. For I open my eyes and am bewildered—perfectly bewildered—and filled with dread. I look at my form in the bed and it seems shifting and queer—now large, now small, now broken up with spaces; and I ot say what age I am. I begin to shake. I call out. I call fnes. I have quite fotten that she has gone. I have fotten Richard Rivers, and all our plot. I call fnes, and it seems to me she es; but she es, to take away my lamp. I think she must do it to punish me. Dont take the light! I say; but she takes it, she leaves me ierrible darkness and I hear the sighing of doors, the passage of feet, beyond the curtain. It seems to me then that much time passes before the light es back. But when Agnes lifts it and sees my face, she screams.

    Dont look at me! I cry. And then: Dont leave me! For I have a sehat, if she will only stay, some calamity, some dreadful thing—I do not know it, ot —will be averted; and I—

    or sne—will be saved. I hide my face against her and seize her hand. But her hand is pale where it used to be freckled. I gaze at her, and do not know her.

    She says, in a voice that is strao me: Its Sue, miss. Only Sue. You see me? You are dreaming.

    Dreaming?

    She touches my cheek. She smooths my hair—not like Agnes, after all, but like— Like no-one. She says again, Its Sue. That Agnes had the scarlatina, and is gone bae. You must lie down now, or the cold will make you ill. You mustnt be ill.

    I swim in black fusion for another moment; then the dream slips from me all at ond I know her, and know myself—my past, my present, my ungaugeable future. She is a strao me, but part of it all.

    Dont leave me, Sue! I say.

    I feel her hesitate. When she draws away, I grip her tighter. But she moves only to climb ae, and she es beh the sheet and lies with her arm about me, her mouth against my hair.

    She is cold, and makes me cold. I shiver, but sooill. There, she says then. She murmurs it. I feel the movement of her breath and, deep in the bone of my cheek, the gentle rumble of her voice. There. Now youll sleep—wont you? Good girl.

    Good girl, she says. How long has it been sinyo Briar believed me good? But she believes it. She must believe it, for the w of our plot. I must be good, and kind, and simple. Isnt gold said to be good? I am like gold to her, after all. She has e to ruin me; but, not yet. For now she must guard me, keep me sound and safe as a hoard of s she means, at last, to squander—

    I know it; but ot feel it as I should. I sleep in her arms, dreamless and still, and wake to the warmth and closeness of her. She moves away as she feels me stir. She rubs her eye. Her hair is loose and touches my own. Her face, in sleep, has lost a little of its sharpness. Her brow is smooth, her lashes powdery, her gaze, when it meets mine, quite clear, untinged with mockery or malice . . . She smiles. She yawns. She rises. The bla lifts and falls, and

    sour heat es gusting. I lie and remember the night. Some feeling—shame, or panic—flutters about my heart. I put my hand to the place where she has lain, and feel it cool.

    She is ged with me. She is surer, kinder. Margaret brings water, and she fills me a bowl. Ready, miss? she says. Better use it quick. She wets a cloth and wrings it and, when I stand and undress, passes it, unasked, ay fad beh my arms. I have bee a child to her. She makes me sit, so she may brush my hair. She tuts: What tahe trick with tangles is, to start at the bottom ...&quot;

    Agnes had used to wash and dress me with quid nervous fingers, wing with every catg of the b. Oime I struck her with a slipper—so hard, she bled. Now I sit for Susan—Sue, she called herself, in the night—now I sit patiently while Sue draws out the knots from my hair, my eyes upon my own fa the glass . . .

    Good girl.

    Then: Thank you, Sue, I say.

    I say it often, in the days and nights that follow. I never said it to Aghank you, Sue. Yes, Sue, when she bids me sit or stand, lift an arm or foot. No, Sue, when she is afraid my gown must pinch me.

    No, I am not cold.—But she likes to look me over as we walk, to be quite sure; will gather my cloak a little higher about my throat, to keep off draughts. No, my boots are not taking in the dew.—But shell slide a finger between my stoged ankle and the leather of my shoe, for certaintys sake. I must not catch cold, at any cost. I must not tire. Wouldnt you say you had walked enough, miss? I mustnt grow ill. Here is all your breakfast, look, untouched. Wont you take a little more? I mustnt grow thin. I am a goose that must be plump, to be worth its slaughter.

    Of course, though she does not know it, it is she who must be plump—she who will learn, in time, to sleep, to wake, to dress, to walk, to a pattern, to signals and bells. She thinks she humours me. She thinks she pities me! She learns the ways of the house, not uanding that the habits and the fabrics that bind me will, soon, bind her. Bind her, like morocco or like calf ... I have grown

    used to thinking of myself as a sort of book. Now I feel myself a book, as books must seem to her: she looks at me with her unread-ing eyes, sees the shape, but not the meaning of the text. She marks the white flesh—Aint you pale! she says—but not the quick, corrupted blood beh.

    I oughtnt to do it. I ot help it. I am too pelled by her idea—her idea of me as a simple girl, abused by circumstance, proo nightmare. No nightmares e, while she sleeps at my side; and so, I find ways t her to my bed, a sed night and a third.—At last she es, routinely. I think her wary, at first; but it is only the opy and drapes that trouble her: she stands each time with a lifted dle, peering into the folds of cloth. Dont you think, she says, of the moths and spiders that might be up there, miss, and waiting to drop? She seizes a post, and shakes it; a single beetle falls, in a shower of dust.

    Once growo that, however, she lies easily enough; and from the  and fortable way she holds her limbs, I think that she must be used to sleeping with someone; and wonder who.

    Do you have sisters, Sue? I ask her once, perhaps a week after she has e. We are walking by the river.

    No, miss.

    Brothers?

    Not as I know of, she says.

    And so you grew up—like me—quite alone?

    Well, miss, not what you would call, alone . . . Say, with cousins all about.

    Cousins. You mean, your aunts children?

    My aunt? She looks blank.

    Your aunt, Mr Riverss nurse.

    Oh! She blinks. Yes, miss. To be sure . . .

    She turns away, and her look grows vague. She is thinking of her home. I try to imagi; and ot. I try to imagine her cousins: rough boys and girls, sharp-faced like her, sharp-tongued, sharp-fingered— Her fingers are blunt, however; though her tongue—for sometimes, when putting the pins to my hair, or frowning over

    slithering laces, she shows it—her tongue has a point. I watch her sigh.

    Never mind, I say—like any kindly mistress with an unhappy maid. Look, here is a barge. You may send your wishes with it. We shall both send wishes, to London. To London, I think again, more darkly. Richard is there. I will be there, a month from now. I say, The Thames will take them, even if the boat does not.

    She looks, however, not at the barge, but at me.

    The Thames? she says.*

    The river, I ahis river, here.

    This trifling bit of water, the Thames? Oh, no, miss. She laughs, uainly. How  that be? The Thames is very wide— she holds her hands far apart—and this is narrow. Do you see?

    I say, after a moment, that I have always supposed that rivers grow wider as they flow. She shakes her head.

    This trifling bit of water? she says again. Why, the water we have from our taps, at home, has more life to it than this.—There, miss! Look, there. The barge has passed us. Its stern is marked in six-inch letters, ROTHERHITHE; but she is pointing, not to them, but to the wake of grease spreading out from the spluttering engine. See that? she says excitedly. Thats how the Thames looks. Thats how the Thames looks, every day of the year. Look at all those colours. A thousand colours ...&quot;

    She smiles. Smiling, she is almost handsome. Then the wake of grease grows thin, the water browns, her smile quite falls; and she looks like a thief again.

    You must uand, I have determio despise her. For how, otherwise, will I be able to do what I must do?—how else deceive and harm her? It is only that ut so long together, in such seclusion. We are obliged to be intimate. And her notion of intimacy is not like Agness—not like Barbaras—not lik<samp>９９ｌiｂ.</samp>e any ladys maids. She is too frank, too loose, too free. She yawns, she leans. She rubs at spots and grazes. She will sit pig over some old dry cut upon her knuckle, while I sew. Then, Got a pin, miss? she will ask me; and when I give her a needle from my case she will spend ten

    minutes probing the skin of her hand with that. Then she will give the needle bae.

    But she will give it, taking care to keep the point from my soft fingers. Dont hurt yourself, she will say—so simply, so kindly, I quite fet that she is only keeping me safe for Richards sake. I think that she fets it, too.

    One day she takes my arm as we are walking. It is nothing to her; but I feel the shock of it, like a slap. Aime, after sitting, I plain that my feet are chilled: she kneels before me, unlaces my slippers, takes my feet in her hands and hold and chafes them— finally dips her head and carelessly breathes upon my toes. She begins to dress me as she pleases; makes little ges to my gowns, my hair, my rooms. She brings flowers: throws away the vases of curling leaves that have always stood on my drawing-room tables, and finds primroses in the hedges of my uncles park to put in their place. Of course, you dohe flowers that you get in London, in the try, she says, as she sets them in the glass; but these are pretty enough, aint they?

    She has Margaret brira coals for my fires, from Mr Way. Such a simple thing to do!—a no-one has thought to do it before, for my sake; even I have not thought to do it; and so I have gone cold, through seven winters. The heat makes the windows cloud. She likes to stand, then, and draw loops as and spirals upon the glass.

    Oime she brings me back from my uncles room and I find the luable spread with playing-cards. My mothers cards, I suppose; for these are my mothers rooms, and filled with her things; a for a sed it quite discerts me, to imagine my mother here—actually here—walking here, sitting here, setting out the coloured cards upon the cloth. My mother, unmarried, still sane—perhaps, idly leaning her cheek upon her knuckles—perhaps, sighing—and waiting, waiting . . .

    I take up a card. It slides against my glove. But in Sues hands, the deck is ged: she gathers and sorts it, shuffles and deals it, ly and nimbly; and the golds and reds are vivid between her fingers, like so many jewels. She is astonished, of course, to learn I

    ot play; and at once makes me sit, so she may teach me. The games are things of d simple speculation, but she plays early, almost greedily—tilting her head, narrowing her eye as she surveys her fan of cards. When I grow tired, she plays alone— or else, will stand the cards upon their ends and tilt their tips together, and from doing this many times will build a rising structure, a kind of pyramid of cards—always keeping back, for the top-most point, a king and a queen.

    Look here, she says, when she has finished. Look here, miss. Do you see? Then she will ease a card from the pyramids foundation; and as the structure topples, she will laugh.

    She will laugh. The sound is as stra Briar, as I imagi must be in a prison or a church. Sometimes, she will sing. Once we talk of dang. She rises and lifts her skirt, to show me a step. Then she pulls me to my feet, and turns and turns me; and I feel, where she presses against me, the quii of her heart—I feel it pass from her to me and beine.

    Finally I let her smooth a poiooth with a silver thimble.

    Let me look, she says. She has seen me rubbing my cheek. e to the light.

    I stand at the window, put back my head. Her hand is warm, her breath—with the yeast of beer upon it—warm also. She reaches, and feels about my gum.

    Well, that is sharper, she says, drawing back her hand, than—

    Than a serpents tooth, Sue?

    Than a needle, I was going to say. She looks about her. Do snakes have teeth, miss?

    I think they must, sihey are said to bite.

    Thats true, she says distractedly. Only, I had imagihem gummier ...&quot;

    She has goo my dressing-room. I  see, through the open door, the bed and, pushed well beh it, the chamber-pot: she has warned me, more than once, of how a pots may break beh the toes of careless risers and make them lame. She has cautioned me, in a similar spirit, against the stepping on, in naked feet, of

    hairs (since hairs—like worms, she says—may work their way into the flesh, aer); the darkening of eye-lashes with impure castor-oil; and the reckless climbing—for purposes of cealment, or flight—of eys. Now, looking through the items on my dressing-table, she says no more. I wait, then call.

    Dont you know anyone who died from a se, Sue?

    A se, miss? She reappears, still frowning. In London? Do you mean, at the Zoo?

    Well, perhaps at the Zoo.

    I t say as I do.

    Curious. I was certain, you know, that you would.

    I smile, though she does not. Then she shows me her hand, with the thimble on it; I see for the first time what she means to do, and perhaps look stra wont hurt you, she says, watg my ging face.

    Are you sure?

    Yes, miss. If I hurt, you may scream; and then I will stop.

    It does not hurt, I do not scream. But it makes for a queer mix of sensations: the grinding of the metal, the pressure of her hand holding my jaw, the softness of her breath. As she studies the tooth she files, I  look nowhere but at her face; and so I look at her eyes: one is marked, I see now, with a fleck of darker brown, almost black. I look at the line of her cheek—which is smooth; and her ear—which is , its lobe pierced through for the wearing of hoops and pendants. Pierced, how? I asked her once, going close to her, putting my fiips to the little dimples in the curving flesh. Why, miss, with a needle, she said, and a bit of ice . . . The thimble rubs on. She smiles. My aunty does this, she says as she works, for babies. I dare say she do for me.—Almost got it! Ha! She grinds more slowly, then pauses, to test the tooth. Then she rubs again. Tricky thing to do to an infant, of course. For if you happen to let slip the thimble—well. I know several as were lost like that.

    I do not know if she means thimbles, or infants. Her fingers, and my lips, are bei. I swallow, then swallow again. My tongue rises and moves against her hand. Her hand seems, all at ooo big, toe; and I think of the tarnish on the silver—

    I think my breath must have made it wet a running, I think I  taste it. Perhaps, if she were to work a little lo the tooth, I should fall into a sort of panic; but now the thimble rubs slain, and soon, she stops. She tests again with her thumb, keeps her hand another sed at my jaw, and then draws back.

    I emerge from her grip a little unsteadily. She has held me so tight, so long, when she moves away the cold air leaps to my face. I swallow, then run my tongue ay bluooth. I wipe my lips. I see her hand: her knuckles marked red and white from the pressure of my mouth; her finger also marked, and with the thimble still upon it. The silver is bright—not tarnished, not tar all. What I have tasted, or imagine I have tasted, is the taste of her; only that.

    May a lady taste the fingers of her maid? She may, in my uncles books.—The thought makes me colour.

    And it is as I am standing, feeling the blood rush awkwardly into my cheek, that a girl es to my door with a letter, from Richard. I have fotten to expect it. I have fotten to think of our plan, our flight, our marriage, the looming asylum gate. I have fotten to think of him. I must think of him now, however. I take the letter and, trembling, break its seal.

    Are you as impatient as I? he writes. I know that you are. Do you have her with you, now?  she see your face? Look glad. Smile, simper, all of that. Our waiting is over. My business in London is done, and I am ing!

 Chapter Ten

    The letter works upon me like the snap of a mesmerists fingers: _y I blink, look giddily about me, as if emerging from a trance. I look at Sue: at her hand, at the mark of my mouth upon it. I look at the pillows upon my bed, with the dints of our two heads. I look at the flowers in their vase oable-top, at the fire in my grate. The room is too warm. The room is too warm a I am still trembling, as if cold. She sees it. She catches my eye, and nods to the paper in my hand. Good news, miss? she asks; and it is as if the letter has worked some trick upon<dfn>9９lｉｂ?</dfoo: for her voice seems light to me—dreadfully light—and her face seems sharp. She puts away the thimble; but watches, watches. I eet her gaze.

    Richard is ing. Does she feel it, as I do? She gives no sign. She walks, she sits, as easily as before. She eats her lunch. She takes out my mothers playing-cards, begins the patient dealing-out of solitary games. I stand at the glass and, in refle, see her reach to take a card and place it, turn it, set it upon another, raise up the

    kings, pull out the aces ... I look at my fad think what makes it mihe certain curve of cheek, the lip too full, too plump, too pink.

    At last she gathers the pack together and says that if I will shuffle and hold it, and wish, she will study the fall of the cards and tell me my future. She says it, apparently quite without irony; ae myself I am drawn to her side, and sit, and clumsily mix the cards, and she takes them <big>.99ｌｉｂ?</big>and lays them down. These show your past, she says, and these your present. Her eyes grow wide. She seems suddenly young to me: for a moment we bend our heads and whisper as I think other, ordinary girls, in ordinary parlours or schools or sculleries, might whisper: Here is a young man, look, on horseback. Here is a journey. Here is the Queen of Diamonds, for wealth—

    I have a brooch that is set with brilliants. I think of it now. I think—as I have, before, though not in many days—of Sue, breathing proprietorially over the stones, gauging their worth . . .

    After all, we are not ordinary girls, in an ordinary parlour; and she is ied in my fortune only as she supposes it hers. Her eye grows narrow again. Her voice lifts out of its whisper and is only pert. I move away from her while she sits gathering the deck, turning the cards in her hands and frowning. She has let one fall, and has not seen it: the two of hearts. I place my heel upon it, imagining one of the painted red hearts my own; and I grind it into the carpet.

    She finds it, when I have risen, and tries to smooth the crease from it; then plays on at Patience, as doggedly as before.

    I look, again, at her hands. They have grown whiter, and are healed about the nails. They are small, and in gloves will seem smaller; and then will resemble my own.

    This must be dohis should have been done, before. Richard is ing, and I am overtaken by a sense of duties u: a panig sehat hours, days—dark, devious fish of time—have slithered by, uncaptured. I pass a fretful night. Then, when we rise and she es to dress me, I pluck at the frill on the sleeve of her gown.

    Have you no own, I say, than this plain brown thing you always wear?

    She says she has not. I take, from my press, a velvet gown, and have her try it. She bares her arms unwillingly, steps out of her skirt and turns, in a kind of modesty, away from my eyes. The gown is narrow. I tug at the hooks. I settle the folds of cloth about her hips, then go to my box for a brooch—that brooch of brilliants—and pin it carefully over her heart.

    Then I stand her before the glass.

    Margaret es, and takes her for me.

    I have growo her, to the life, the warmth, the particularity of her; she has bee, not the gullible girl of a villainous plot—not Suky Tawdry—but a girl with a history, with hates and likings. Now all at once I see how o me in fad figure shell e, and I uand, as if for the first time, what it is that Richard and I mean to do. I place my face against the post of my bed and watch her, gazing at herself in a rising satisfa, turning a little to the left, a little to the right, brushing the creases from her skirt, settling her flesh more fortably into the seams of the gown. If my aunty could see me! she says, growing pink; and I think, then, of who might be waiting for her, in that dark thieves den in London: the aunt, the mother randmother. I think how restless she must be, as she ts off the lengthening days that keep her little fin-gersmith on perilous business, far from home. I imagine her, as she waits, taking out some small thing of Sues—some sash, some necklace, some bracelet of gaudy charms—and turning it, over and over, in her hands . . .

    She will turn it for ever, though she does not know it yet. Nor does Sue suppose that the last time she kissed her aunts hard cheek was the last of all her life.

    I think of that; and I am gripped with what I take to be pity. It is hard, painful, surprising: I feel it, and am afraid. Afraid of what my future may e. Afraid of that future itself, and of the unfamiliar, ungovernable emotions with which it might be filled.

    She does not know it. He must not know it, either. He es that

    afternoon—es, as he used to e, in the days of Agakes my hand, holds my gaze with his, bends to kiss my knuckles. Miss Lilly/ he says, in a tone of caress. He is dressed darkly, ly; yet carries his daring, his fidence, close and gaudy about him, like swirls of colour or perfume. I feel the heat of his mouth, even through my gloves. Theurns to Sue, and she makes a curtsey. The stiff-bodiced dress is not made for curtseying in, however: the dip is a jagged ohe fringes upon her skirt tumble together ao shake. Her colour rises. I see him smile as he . But I see, too, that he marks the goerhaps also the whiteness of her fingers. I should have supposed her a lady, Im sure, he says, to me. He moves to her side. There, he seems tall, and darker than ever, like a bear; and she seems slight. He takes her hand, his fingers moving about hers: they seem large, also—his thumb extends almost to the bone of her wrist. He says, I hope you are proving a good girl for your mistress, Sue.

    She gazes at the floor. I hope I am, too, sir. I take a step. She is a very good girl, I say. A very good girl, indeed.

    But the words are hasty, imperfect. He catches my eye, draws back his thumb. Of course, he says smoothly, she could not help but be good. No girl could help it, Miss Lilly, with you for her example.

    You are too kind, I say.

    leman could but be, I think, with you to be kind to. He keeps his gaze on mine. He has picked me out, found sympathies in me, means to pluck me from the heart of Briar, unscratched; and I would not be myself, o my uncle, if I could meet the look he shows me now without feeling the stir of some excitement, dark and awful, in my ow. But I feel it too hard, and grow almost queasy. I smile; but the smile stretches tight. Sue tilts her head. Does she suppose me smiling at my own love? The thought makes the smile tighter still, I begin to feel it as an ache about my throat. I avoid her eye, and his. He goes, but makes her step to him and they stand a moment, murmuring at the door. He gives her a —I see the yellow gleam of it—he puts it into

    her hand, closes her fingers about it with his own. His nail shows brown against the fresh pink of her palm. She falls in another awkward curtsey.

    Now my smile is fixed like the grima the face of a corpse. Wheurns back, I ot look at her. I go to my dressing-room and close the door, lie face down upon my bed, and am seized and shaken by laughter—a terrible laughter, it courses silently through me, like filthy water—I shudder, and shudder, and finally am still.

    How do you find your new girl, Miss Lilly? he asks me at dinner, his eyes upon his plate. He is carefully parti from the spine of a fish—the bone so pale and so fi is almost translut, the meat in a thiing coating of butter and sauce. Our food es cold to the table in winter. In summer it es too warm.

    I say, Very—biddable, Mr Rivers.

    You think she will suit?

    I think so, yes.

    You wont have cause to plain, of my reendation?

    No.

    Well, I am relieved to hear it.

    He will always say too much, for the sport of the thing. My uncle is watg. Whats this? he says now.

    I wipe my mouth. My new maid, Uncle, I answer. Miss Smith, who replaces Miss Fee. Youve seen her, often.

    Heard her, more like, kig the soles of her boots against my library door. What of her?

    She came to me on Mr Riverss word. He found her in London, in need of a place; and was so kind as to remember me.

    My uncle moves his tongue. Was he? he says slowly. He looks from me to Richard, from Richard bae, his  a little raised, as if sensing dark currents. Miss Smith, you say?

    Miss Smith, I repeat steadily, who replaces Miss Fee. I en my knife and fork. Miss Fee, the papist.

    The papist! Ha! He returedly to his ow. Now, Rivers, he says as he does it.

    Sir?

    I defy you—positively defy you, sir!—to name me any institution so nurturing of the atrocious acts of lechery as the Catholic Church of Rome

    He does not look at me again until supper is ehen has me read for an hour from an antique text, The Nunns plaint Against the Fryars.

    Richard sits and hears me, perfectly still. But when I have finished and rise to leave, he rises also: Let me, he says. We walk together the little way to the door. My uncle does not lift his head, but keeps his gaze on his own smudged hands. He has a little pearl-handled ks a blade sharpened almost to a crest, with which he is paring the skin from an apple—one of the small, dry, bitter apples that grow in the Briar orchard.

    Richard checks to see that his gaze is turhen looks at me frankly. His tone he keeps polite, however. I must ask you, he says, if you wish to tih your drawing-lessons, now that Im returned? I hope you do. He waits. I do not answer. Shall I e, as usual, tomorrow? He waits again. He has his hand upon the door and has drawn it baot far enough, though, to let me step about it; nor does he pull it further when he sees me wishing to pass. Instead, his look grows puzzled. You mustnt be modest, he says. He means, You mustnt be weak. You are not, are you?

    I shake my head.

    Good, then. I shall e, at the usual time. You must show me the work youve done while Ive been away. I should say a little more labour and—well, who knows? We might be ready to surprise your uh the fruits of your instru. What do you think? Shall we give it awo weeks? Two weeks or, at the most, three?

    Again, I feel the nerve and daring of him, feel my own blood rise to meet it. But there es, beh or beyond it, a sinking, a fluttering—a vague and nameless movement—a sort of panic. He waits for my reply, and the fluttering grows wilder. lotted so carefully. We have itted, already, one dreadful deed, a in train another. I know all that must be done now. I know I must seem

    to love him, let him appear to wihen fess his winning to Sue. How easy it should be! How I have longed for it! How hard I have gazed at the walls of my uncles estate, wishing they might part and release me! But now that the day of our escape is close, I hesitate; and am afraid to say why. I gaze again at my uncles hands, the pearl, the apple giving up its skin to the knife.

    Let us say, three weeks—perhaps longer, I say finally. Perhaps longer, should I feel I .

    A look of irritatier disturbs the surface of his face; but when he speaks, he makes his voice soft. You are modest. Your talent is better than that. Three weeks will do it, I assure you.

    He draws back the door at last and bows me out. And though I do not turn, I know he lio watch me mount the stairs—as solicitous for my safety, as any of my uncles gentlemen friends.

    He will grow more solicitous, soon; but for now, at least, the days fall bato something like a familiar pattern. He passes his ms at work on the prints, then es to my rooms, to teach me drawing—to keep close to me, that is to say; to look and to murmur, while I daub paint on card; to be grave and ostentatiously gallant.

    The days fall ba their pattern—except that, where before they had Agnes in them, now they have Sue.

    And Sue is not like Agnes. She knows more. She knows her own worth and purpose. She knows she must listen and watch, to see that Mr Rivers does not e too close, or speak too fidentially, to her mistress; but she also knows that when he does e near she is to turn her head aside and be deaf to his whispers. She does turn her head, I see her do it; but I see her, too, steal gla us from the edge of her eye—study our refles in the ey-glass and windows—watch our very shadows! The room, in which I have passed so many captive hours I know it as a prisoner knows his cell—the room seems ged to me now. It seems filled with shining surfaces, eae an eye of hers.

    When those eyes meet mihey are veiled and blameless. But when they meet Richards, I see the leap of knowledge or uanding that passes between them; and I ot look at her.

    For of course, though she knows much, what she has is a terfeit knowledge, and worthless; and her satisfa in the keeping of it—in the nursing of what she supposes her secret—is awful to me. She does not know she is the hinge of all our scheme, the point about which our plot turns; she thinks I am that point. She does not suspect that, in seeming to mock me, Richard mocks her: that after he has turo her in private, perhaps to smile, perhaps to grimace, he turns to me, and smiles and grimaces in ear.

    And where his t of Agnes pricked me on to little cruelties of my own, now I am only unnerved. My sciousn<cite>?</cite>ess of Sue makes me too scious of myself—makes me, now reckless, as Richard is sometimes reckless, in the gross performance of our sham passion; now guarded and watchful, hesitating. I will be bold for an hour—or meek, or coy—and then, in the final minute of his stay, I will tremble. I will be betrayed by the movement of my own limbs, my blood, my breath.—I suppose she reads that as love.

    Richard, at least, knows it for weakness. The days creep by: the first week passes, and we begin the sed. I sense his bafflement, feel the weight of his expectation: feel it gather, turn, grow sour. He looks at my work, and begins to shake his head.

    I am afraid, Miss Lilly, he says, more than ohat you want discipline, yet. I thought your touch firmer than this. I am sure it was firmer, a month ago. Dont say youve fotten your lessons, in my short absence. After all our labour! There is ohing an artist must always avoid, in the execution of his work: that is, hesitation. For that leads to weakness; and through weakness, greater designs than this one have foundered. You uand? You do uand me?

    I will not answer. He leaves, and I keep at my place. Sue es to my side.

    Never mind it, miss, she says gently, if Mr Rivers seems to say hard things about your picture. Why, you got those pears, quite to the life.

    You think so, Sue?

    She nods. I look into her fato her eye, with its single fleck of darker brown. Then I look at the shapeless daubs of colour I have put upon the card.

    Its a wretched painting, Sue, I say.

    She puts her hand upon mine. Well, she says, but aint you learning?

    I am, but not quickly enough. He suggests, in time, that we go walking in the park.

    We must work from nature now, he says.

    I should rather not, I tell him. I have my paths, that I like to walk with Sue beside me. I think that to walk them with him will spoil them. I should rather not, I say again.

    He frowns, then smiles. As your instructor, he says, I must insist.

    I hope it will rain. But though the sky above Briar has been grey all that winter long—has been grey, it seems to me, for seven years!—it lightens now, for him. There is only a quick, soft wind, that es gusting about my unskirted ankles as Mr Way tugs open the door.—Thank you, Mr Way, says Richard, bending his arm for me to take. He wears a low black hat, a dark wool coat, and lavender gloves. Mr Way observes the gloves, then looks at me in a kind of satisfa, a kind of s.

    Fancy yourself a lady, do you? he said to me, the day he carried me, kig, to the ice-house. Well, well see.

    I will not walk to the ice-house today, with Richard, but choose another path—a longer, blander path, that circles my uncles estate, rises and overlooks the rear of the house, the stables, woods, and chapel. I know the view too well to want to gaze at it, and walk with my eyes upon the ground. He keeps my arm in his, and Sue follows behind us—first close, then falling back when he makes our pace grow brisk. We do not speak, but as we walk he slowly draws me to him. My skirt rises, awkwardly.

    When I try to pull away, however, he will not let me. I say at last: You need not hold me so close.

    He smiles. We must seem ving.

    You  grip me so. Have you anything to whisper, that I dont already know?

    He gazes quickly over his shoulder. She would think it queer, he

    says, were I to let slip these ces to be near you. Anyone would think that queer.

    She knows you do not love me. You have o dote.

    Shouldnt a gentleman dote, in the springtime, when he has the ce? He puts back his head. Look at this sky, Maud. See how siingly blue it shows. So blue—he has lifted his hand—it jars with my gloves. Thats nature for you. No sense of fashion. London skies, at least, are better-maheyre like tailors walls, aernal drab. He smiles again, and draws me closer. But of course, you will know this, soon.

    I try to imagine myself in a tailors shop. I recall ses from The Whipping Milliners. I turn and, like him, quickly gla Sue. She is watg, with a frown of what I take to be satisfa, the bulging of my skirt about his leg. Again I attempt to pull from him, and again he keeps me close. I say, Will you let me go? And, when he does nothing: I must suppose, then, since you know I dont care to be smothered, that you take a delight in tormenting me.

    He catches my eye. I am like any man, he says, preoccupied with what I may not have. Hasten the day of our union. I think youll find my attention will cool pretty rapidly, after that.

    Then I say nothing. We walk on, and in time he lets me go, in order to cup his hands about a cigarette and light it. I look again at Sue. The ground has risen, the breeze is stronger, and two or three lengths of brown hair have e loose from beh her bo and whip about her face. She carries s and baskets, and has no hand free to secure them. Behind her, her cloak billows like a sail.

    Is she all right? asks Richard, drawing on his cigarette.

    I turn and look ahead. Quite all right.

    She is stouter than Agnes, anynes! I wonder how she does, hey? He takes my arm again, and laughs. I do not answer, and his laughter fades. e, Maud, he says, in a cooler tone, dont be so spinsterish. What has happeo you?

    Nothing has happeo me.

    He studies my profile. Then, why do you make us wait? Everything is in place. Everything is ready. I have taken a house for us, in London. London houses do not e cheaply, Maud

    I walk on, in silence, aware of his gaze. He pulls me close again. You have not, I suppose, he says, had a ge of heart? Have you?

    No.

    You are sure?

    Quite sure.

    A, you still delay. Why is that? I do not answer. Maud, I ask you again. Something has happened, since I saw you last. What is it?

    Nothing has happened, I say.

    Nothing?

    Nothing, but what we planned for.

    And you know what must be done now?

    Of course.

    Do it then, will you? Act like a lover. Smile, blush, grow foolish.

    Do I not do those things?

    You do—then spoil them, with a grimace or a flinch. Look at you now. Lean into my arm, damn you. Will it kill you, to feel my hand upon yours?—I am sorry I have grown stiff at his words. I am sorry, Maud.

    Let go of my arm, I say.

    We go further, side by side but in silence. Sue plods behind—I hear her breaths, like sighs. Richard throws dowt of his cigarette, tears up a switch of grass and begins to lash at his boots. How filthy red this earth is! he says. But, what a treat for little Charles . . . He smiles to himself. Then his foot turns up a flint and he almost stumbles. That makes him curse. He rights himself, and looks me over. I see you walk more nimbly. You like it, hmm? You may walk in London like this, you know. On the parks ahs. Did you know? Or else, you may choose not to walk, ever again— you may rent carriages, chairs, men to drive and carry you about—

    I know what I may do.

    Do you? Truly? He puts the stem of grass to his mouth and grows thoughtful. I wonder. You are afraid, I think. Of what? Being alone? Is it that? You need never fear solitude, Maud, while you are rich.

    You think I feax solitude? I say. We are close to the wall of my uncles park. It is high, grey, dry as powder. You think I fear that? I fear nothing, nothing.

    He casts the grass aside, takes up my arm. Why, then, he says, do you keep us here, in such dreadful suspense?

    I do not answer. We have slowed our step. Now we hear Sue, still breathing hard behind us, and walk on more quickly. When he speaks again, his tone has ged.

    You spoke, a moment ago, of torment. The truth is, I think you like to torment yourself, by prolonging this time.

    I shrug, as if in carelessness; though I do not feel careless. My uncle said something similar to me once, I say. That was before I became like him. It is hardly a torment to me now, to wait. I am used to it.

    I am not, however, he replies. Nor do I wish to take instru i, from you or anyone. I have lost too much, in the past, through waiting. I am cleverer now, at manipulatis to match my needs. That is what I have learned, while you have learned patience. Do you uand me, Maud?

    I turn my head, half-y eyes. I dont want to uand you, I say tiredly. I wish you would not speak at all.

    I will speak, until you hear.

    Hear what?

    Hear this. He brings his mouth close to my face. His beard, his lips, his breath, are tainted with smoke, like a devils. He says: Remember our tract. Remember how we made it. Remember that when I came to you first I came, not quite as a gentleman, and with little to lose—unlike you, Miss Lilly, who saw me alo midnight, in your own room ...&quot; He draws back. I suppose your reputation must t for something, even here; Im afraid that ladies always do.—But naturally you khat, when you received me.

    His tone has some new edge to it, some quality I have not heard before. But we have ged our course: when I gaze at his face the light is all behind him, making his expression hard to read.

    I say carefully, You call me a lady; but I am hardly that.

    A, I think your uncle must sider you one. Will he like to think you corrupted?

    He has corrupted me himself!

    Then, will he like to think the work taken over by another mans hand?—I am speaking only, of course, of what he will suppose to be the case.

    I move away. You misuand him, entirely. He siders me a sort of engine, for the reading and copying of texts.

    All the worse. He shant like it, when the engine bucks. What say he disposes of it and makes himself another?

    Now I  feel the beat of the blood in my brow. I put my fio my eyes. Doiresome, Richard. Disposes of it, how?

    Why, by sending it home . . .

    The beat seems to stumble, then quis. I draw back my fingers, but again the light is behind him and I ot quite make out his face. I say, very quietly, I shall be no use to you, in a madhouse.

    You are no use to me now, while you delay! Be careful I dont grow tired of this scheme. I shant be kind to you, then.

    And is this kindness? I say.

    We have moved, at last, into shadow, and I see his look: it is ho, amused, amazed. He says: This is dreadful villainy, Maud. When did I ever call it anything else?

    We stop, close as sweethearts. His tone has grown light again, but his eye is hard—quite hard. I feel, for the first time, what it would be to be afraid of him.

    He turns and calls to Sue. Not far now, Suky! We are almost there, I think. To me he murmurs: I shall need some minutes with her, alone.

    To secure her, I say. As you have me.

    That work is done, he says platly; and she, at least, sticks better.—What? I have shuddered, or my look has ged. You dont suspect her of qualms? Maud? You dont suppose her weakening, or playing us false? Is that why you hesitate? I shake my head. Well, he goes on, all the more reason for me to see her, to find out how she thinks we do. Have her e to me, today or tomorrow. Find out some way, will you? Be sly.

    He puts his smoke-stained fio his mouth. Presently Sue es, as at my side. She is flushed from the weight of the bags. Her cloak still billows, her hair still whips, and I want more than anything to draw her to me, to toud tidy her. I think I begin to, I think I half-reach for her; then I bee scious of Richard and his shrewd, sidering gaze. I y arms before me and turn away.

    m I have her take him a coal from the fire, to light his cigarette from; and I stand with my brow against my dressing-room window and watch them whisper. She keeps her head turned from me, but when she leaves him he raises his eyes to me and holds my gaze, as he held it once before, in darkness. Remember our tract, he seems again to say. Then he drops his cigarette and stands heavily upon it; then shakes free the ging red soil from his shoes.

    After that, I feel the mounting pressure of our plot as I think men must feel the straining of checked maery, tethered beasts, the gathering of tropical storms. I wake each day and think: Today I will do it! Today I will draw free the bolt ahe engine race, unleash the beast, puncture the l clouds! Today, I will let him claim me—!

    But, I do not. I look at Sue, and there es, always, that shadow, that darkness—a panic, I suppose it, a simple fear—a quaking, a g—a dropping, as into the sour mouth of madness—

    Madness, my mothers malady, perhaps beginning its slow ast ihat thought makes me more frightened yet. I take, for a day or two, more of my drops: they calm me, but ge me. My uncle marks it.

    You grow clumsy, he says, one m. I have mishandled a book. You think I have you e, day after day, to my library, to abuse it?

    No, Uncle.

    What? Do you mumble?

    No, sir.

    He wets and purses his mouth, and studies me harder. When he speaks again, his tone is strao me.

    What age are you? he says. I am surprised, aate. He sees it. Dont strike coy attitudes with me, miss! What age are you? Sixteeeen?—You may show astonishment. You think me insensible to the passage of years, because I am a scholar? Hmm?

    I am seventeen, Uncle.

    Seventeen. A troublesome age, if we are to believe our own books.

    Yes, sir.

    Yes, Maud. Only remember: your business is not with belief, but with study. Remember this, also: you are not too great a girl— nor am I too aged a scholar—for me to have Mrs Stiles e and hold you still while I take a whip to you. Hmm? Youll remember these things? Will you?

    Yes, sir, I say.

    It seems to me now, however, that I must remember too much. My face, my joints, are set ag with the effort of striking looks and poses. I o longer say with certainty whiy as— whiy feelings, everue ones, which are sham. Richard still keeps his gaze close upon me. I will not meet it. He is reckless, teasing, threatening: I choose not to uand. Perhaps I am weak, after all. Perhaps, as he and my uncle believe, I draleasure from torment. It is certainly a torment to me now, to sit at a lesson with him, to sit at a diable with him, to read to him, at night, from my uncles books. It begins to be a torment, too, to pass time with Sue. Our routines are spoiled. I am too scious that she waits, as he does: I feel her watg, gauging, willing me on. Worse, she begins to speak in his behalf—to tell me, bluntly, how clever he is, how kind and iing.

    You think so, Sue? I ask her, my eyes upon her face; and her gaze might flutter uneasily away, but she will always answer: Yes, miss. Oh, yes, miss. Anyone would say it, wouldnt they?

    Then she will make me —always , handsome a— she will take down my hair and dress it, straighten seams, lift lint from the fabriy gowns. I think she does it as much to calm

    herself, as to calm me. There, she will say, when she has finished. Now you are better.—Now she is better, she means. Now your brow is smooth. How creased it was, before! It mustnt be creased—

    It mustnt be creased, for Mr Riverss sake: I hear the unspoken words, my blood surges again; I take her arm in mine and pinch it.

    Oh!

    I do not know who cries it, she or I: I reel away, unnerved. But in the sed I have her skiween my fingers, my own flesh leaps in a kind of relief. I shake, horribly, for almost an hour.

    Oh, God! I say, hiding my face. Im afraid, for my own mind! Do you think me mad? Do you think me wicked, Sue?

    Wicked? she answers, wringing her hands. And I  see her thinking: A simple girl like you?

    She puts me into my bed and lies with her arm against mine; but soon she sleeps, and then draws away. I think of the house in which I lie. I think of the room beyond the bed—its edges, its surfaces. I think I shall not sleep, unless I touch them. I rise, it is cold, but I go quietly from thing to thing—ey-piece, dressing-table, carpet, press. Then I e to Sue. I would like to touch her, to be sure that she is there. I dare not. But I ot leave her. I lift my hands and move and hold them an inch, just an inch, above her—her hip, her breast, her curling hand, her hair on the pillow, her face, as she sleeps.

    I do that, perhaps three nights in a row. Then this happens.

    Richard begins to make us go to the river. He has Sue sit far from me, against the upturned boat; and he, as always, keeps close at my side, pretending to watch as I paint. I paint the same spot so many times, the card starts to rise and crumble beh my brush; but I paint on, stubbornly, and he will now and then lean close <tt>.t>to whisper, idly but fiercely:

    God damn you, Maud, how  you sit so calm and steady? Hey? Do you hear that bell? The Briar clock sounds clearly there, beside the water. Theres another hohat we might have passed in freedom. Instead, you keep us here—

    Will you move? I say. You are standing in my light.

    You are standing in mine, Maud. See how easy it is, to remove that shadow? Otle step is all that must be made. Do you see? Will you look? She wont. She prefers her painting. That piece of— Oh! Let me find a match, I shall burn it!

    I gla Sue. Be quiet, Richard.

    But the days grow warm, and at last es a day, so close and airless, the heat overpowers him. He spreads his coat upon the ground and sprawls upon it, tilts his hat to shadow his eyes. For a time, then, the afternoon is still and almost pleasant: there is only the calling s in the rushes, the slapping of water, the cries of birds, the occasional passing of boats. I draw the paint across the card in ever finer, ever slower strokes, and almost fall into slumber.

    Then Richard laughs, and my hand gives a jump. I turn to look at him. He puts his fio his lip. See there, he says softly. And he gestures to Sue.

    She still sits before the upturned boat, but her head has fallen back against the rotten wood and her limbs are spread and loose. A blade of hair, dark at the tip where she has been biting at it, curves to the er of her mouth. Her eyes are closed, her breaths e evenly. She is quite asleep. The sun slants against her fad shows the point of her , her lashes, her darkening freckles. Between the edges of her gloves and the cuffs of her coat are two narrow strips of pinking flesh.

    I look again at Richard—meet his eye—then turn bay painting. I say quietly, Her cheek will burn. Wont you wake her?

    Shall I? He sniffs. They are not much used to sunlight, where she es from. He speaks almost fondly, but laughs against the words; then adds in a murmur: Nor where shes going, I think. Poor bitch—she might sleep. She has been asleep since I first got her and brought her here, and has not known it.

    He says it, not with relish, but as if with i at the idea. Theretches and yawns ao his feet, and she fiher troubles him. He puts his knuckles to his nose and violently sniffs. I beg your pardon, he says, drawing out his handkerchief.

    Sue does not wake, but frowns and turns her head. Her lower lip

    slightly falls. The blade of hair swings from her cheek, but keeps its curve and point. I have lifted my brush and touched it oo my crumbling painting; now I hold it, an inch from the card; and I watch, as she sleeps. Only that. Richard sniffs again, softly curses the heat, the season. Then, as before, I suppose he grows still. I suppose he studies me. I suppose the brush in my fingers drops paint—for I find it later, black paint upon my blue gown. I do not mark it as it falls, however; and perhaps it is my not marking it, that betrays me. That, or my look. Sue frowns again. I watch, a little lohen I turn, and find Richards eyes upon me.

    Oh, Maud, he says.

    That is all he says. But in his face I see, at last, how much I want her.

    For a moment we do nothing. Theeps to me and takes my wrist. The paintbrush falls.

    e quickly, he says. e quickly, before she wakes.

    He takes me, stumbling, along the line of rushes. We walk as the water flows, about the bend of the river and the wall. Wheop, he puts his hands to my shoulders and holds me fast.

    Oh, Maud, he says again. Here I have been, supposing you gripped by a sce, or some other weakness like that. But this—!

    I have turned my face from him, but feel him laugh. Dont smile, I say, shuddering. Dont laugh.

    Laugh? You might be glad I dont do worse. Youll know—youll know, if anyone will!—the sports to which gentlemens appetites are said to be pricked, by matters like this. Thank heavens Im not a gentleman so much as a rogue: we go by different codes. You may love a<s>..</s>nd be damned, for all I care.—Dont wriggle, Maud! I have tried to twist from his hands. He holds me tighter, thes me lean from him a little, but grips my waist. You may love and be damned, he says again. But keep me from my money—keep us languishing here: put back our plot, our hopes, your own bright future—you shall not, no. Not now I know what trifling thing you have made us stay for. Now, let her wake up.—I promise you, it is as tiresome to me as to you, when you twist so!—Let her wake up

    and seek us out. Let her see us like this. You wont e to me? Very good. I shall hold you here, a her suppose us lovers at last; and so have doh it. Stand steady, now.

    He leans from me and gives a wordless shout. The sous against the thick air and makes it billow, then fades to a silence.

    That will bring her, he says.

    I move my arms. You are hurting me.

    Stand like a lover then, and I shall grow gentle as anything. He smiles again. Suppose me her.—Ah! Now I have tried to strike him. Do you mean to make me bruise you?

    He holds me harder, keeping his hands upo pinning down my arms with his own. He is tall, he is strong. His fingers meet about my waist—as young mens fingers are meant to do, I believe, on the waists of their sweethearts. For a time I strain against the pressure: we stand braced and sweating as a pair of wrestlers in a ring. But I suppose that, from a distance, we might seem swaying in a kind of love.

    But I think this dully; and soon I feel myself begin to tire. The sun is still hot upon us. The frogs still t, the water still laps among the reeds. But the day has been punctured or ripped: I  feel it begin to droop ale, close about me, in suffog folds.

    I am sorry, I say weakly.

    You  be sorry, now.

    It is only—

    You must be strong. I have seen you be strong, before.

    It is only—

    But, only what? How might I say it? Only that she held my head against her breast, when I woke bewildered. That she warmed my foot with her breath, ohat she ground my poiooth with a silver thimble. That she brought me soup—clear soup—instead of an egg, and smiled to see me drink it. That her eye has a darker fleck of brown. That she thinks me good . . .

    Richard is watg my face. Listen to me, Maud, he says now. He pulls me tight. I am sagging in his arms. Listen! If it were any girl but her. If it were Agnes! Hey? But this is the girl that must be cheated, and robbed of her liberty, for us to be free. This is the girl

    the doctors will take, while we look on without a murmur. You remember our plan? I nod. But— What?

    I begin to fear that, after all, I havent the heart for it...&quot; Youve a heart, instead, for little fingersmiths? Oh, Maud. Now his voice is rich with s. Have you fotten what she has e to you for? Do you think she has fotten? Do you suppose yourself anything to her, but that? You have been too long among your uncles books. Girls love easily, there. That is the point of them. If they loved so in life, the books would not have to be written.

    He looks me over. She would laugh in your face, if she knew. His tone grows sly. She would laugh in mine, were I to tell her ...&quot; You shall not tell her! I say, lifting my head and stiffening. The thought is awful to me. Tell her once, and I keep at Briar food. My uncle shall know how youve used me—I shant care how he treats me for it.

    I shall not tell her, he answers slowly, if you will only do as you must, with no further delay. I shall not tell her, if you will let her think you love me and have agreed to be my wife; and so make good our escape, as you promised.

    I turn my face from his. Again there is a silehen I murmur—what else should I murmur?—I will. He nods, and sighs. He still holds me tightly, and after another momes his mouth against my ear.

    Here she es! he whispers. She is creeping about the wall. She means to watd not disturb us. Now, let her know I have you . . .

    He kisses my head. The bulk a and pressure of him, the warmth and thiess of the day, my own fusion, make me stand a him, limply. He takes one hand from about my waist and lifts my arm. He kisses the cloth of my sleeve. When I feel his mouth upon my wrist, I flinow, now, he says. Be good, for a moment. Excuse my whiskers. Imagine my mouth hers. The words e wetly upon my flesh. He pushes my glove a little way along my hand, he parts his lips, he touches my palm with the point of his

    ngue; and I shudder, with weakness, with fear and distaste—with rlsmay, to know Sue stands and watches, in satisfa, thinking me his.

    For he has showo myself. He leads me to her, we walk to the house, she takes my cloak, takes my shoes; her cheek is pink, after all- she stands frowning at the glass, moves a hand, lightly, across her face . . ? That is all she does; but I see it, and my heart gives a pluhat g, or dropping, that has so much pani it, so much darkness, I supposed it fear, or madness. I watch her turn and stretch, walk her random way about the room—see her make all the careless unstudied gestures I have marked so covetously, so long. Is this desire? How queer that I, of all people, should not know! But I thought desire smaller, er; I supposed it bound to its own ans as taste is bound to the mouth, vision to the eye. This feeling haunts and inhabits me, like a siess. It covers me, like skin.

    I think she must see it. Now he has , I think it must colour or mark me—I think it must mark me crimson, like paint marks the hot red points, the lips and gashes and bare whipped limbs, of my uncles pictures. I am afraid, that night, to undress before her. I am afraid to lie at her side. I am afraid to sleep. I am afraid I will dream of her. I am afraid that, in dreaming, I will turn and touch her ...

    But after all, if she sehe ge in me, she thinks I am ged because of Richard. If she feels me tremble, if she feels my heart beat hard, she thinks I tremble for him. She is waiting, still waiting.  day I take her walking to my mrave. I sit and gaze at the stohat I have kept so  and free from blemish. I should like to smash it with a hammer. I wish—as I have wished many times—that my mother were alive, so that I might kill her again. I say to Sue: Do you know, how it was she died? It was my birth that did it!—and it is an effort, to keep the note of triumph from my voice.

    She does not catch it. She watches me, and I begin to weep; and where she might say anything to e—anything at all— what she says is: Mr Rivers.

    I look from her in pt, then. She es and leads me to the chapel door—perhaps, to turn my thoughts te. The door is locked and t be passed. She waits for me to speak. At last I tell her, dutifully: Mr Rivers has asked me to marry him, Sue.

    She says she is glad. And, when I weep again—false tears, this time, that wash away the true ones—and when I choke and wring my hands and cry out, Oh! What shall I do?, she touches me and holds my gaze, and says: He loves you.

    You think he does?

    She says she knows it. She does not flinch. She says, You must follow your heart.

    I am not sure, I say. If I might only be sure!

    But to love, she says, and then to lose him!

    I grow too scious of the closeness of her gaze, and look away. She talks to me of beating blood, of thrilling voices, of dreams. I feel his kiss, like a burn upon my palm; and all at once she sees, not that I love him, but how much I have e to fear and hate him.

    She grows white. What will you do? she says, in a whisper.

    What  I do? I say. What choice have I?

    She does not answer. She only turns from me, to gaze for a moment at the barred chapel door. I look at the pale of her cheek, at her jaw, at the mark of the needle in the lobe of her ear. Wheurns back, her face has ged.

    Marry him, she tells me. He loves you. Marry him, and do everything he says.

    She has e to Briar to ruio cheat me and do me harm. Look at her, I tell myself. See how slight she is, how brown and trifling! A thief, a little fingersmith—/1 think I will swallow down my desire, as I have swallowed down grief, and rage. Shall I be thwarted, shall I be checked—held to my past, kept from my future—by her? I think, / shant. The day of our flight draws near. / shant. The month grows warmer, the nights grow close. / shant, I shant—

    You are cruel, Richard says. I dont think you love me as you ought. I think— and he glances, slyly, at Sue—I think there must be someone else you care for . . .

    Sometimes I see him look at her, and think he has told her. Sometimes she looks at me, sely—or else her hands, in toug me, seem so stiff, so nervous and unpractised—I think she knows. Now and then I am obliged to leave them aloogether, in my own room; he might tell her, then.

    What do you say, Suky, to this? She loves you!

    Loves me? Like a lady loves her maid?

    Like certain ladies love their maids, perhaps. Hasnt she found little ways to keep you close about her?—Have I dohat? Hasnt she feigroublesome dreams?—Is that what I have done? Has she had you kiss her? Careful, Suky, she doesnt try to kiss you back . . .

    Would she laugh, as he said she would? Would she shiver? It seems to me she lies more cautiously beside me now, her legs and arms tucked close. It seems to me she is often wary, watchful. But the more I think it, the more I wahe more my desire rises and swells. I have e to terrible life—or else, the things about me have e to life, their crown too vivid, their surfaces too harsh. I flinch, from falling shadows. I seem to see figures start out from the fading patterns in the dusty carpets and drapes, or creep, with the milky blooms of damp, across the ceilings and walls.

    Even my uncles books are ged to me; and this is worse, this is worst of all. I have supposed them dead. Now the words— like the figures in the walls—start up, are filled with meaning. I grow muddled, stammer. I lose my place. My uncle shrieks— seizes, from his desk, a paperweight of brass, and throws it at me. That steadies me, for a time. But then he has me read, one night, from a certain work . . . Richard watches, his hand across his mouth, a look of amusement dawning on his face. For the work tells of all the means a woman may employ to pleasure another, when in want of a man.

    And she pressed her lips and too it, and into it—

    You like this, Rivers? asks my uncle.

    I fess, sir, I do.

    Well, so do mahough I fear it is hardly to my taste. Still, I am glad to note your i. I address the subject fully, of course, in my Index. Read on, Maud. Read on.

    I do. Ae myself—and in spite of Richards dark, tormenting gaze—I feel the stale words rouse me. I colour, and am ashamed. I am ashamed to think that what I have supposed the secret book of my heart may be stamped, after all, with no more miserable matter than this—have its pla my uncles colle. I leave the drawing-room eaight and go upstairs—go slowly, tapping the toes of my slippered feet against each step. If I strike them equally, I shall be safe. Then I stand in darkness. When Sue es to undress me I will myself to suffer her touch, coolly, as I think a mannequin of wax might suffer the quick, indifferent touches of a tailor.

    A, even wax limbs must yield at last, to the heat of the hands that lift and place them. There es a night when, finally, I yield to hers.

    I have begun, in sleeping, to dream unspeakable dreams; and to wake, each time, in a fusion of longing and fear. Sometimes she stirs. Sometimes she does not. Go back to sleep, she will say, if she does. Sometimes I do. Sometimes I dont. Sometimes I rise and go about the room; sometimes, take drops. I take drops, this night; theurn to her side; but sink, not into lethargy, but only into more fusion. I think of the books I have lately read, to Richard and to my uhey e bae, now, in phrases, fragments—pressed her lips and toakes hold of my hand—hip, lip and tongue—forced it half-strivingly—took hold of my breasts—opened wide the lips of my little—the lips of her little t—

    I ot silehem. I  almost see them, rising darkly from their oages, to gather, to swarm and bine. I put my hands before my face. I do not know how long I lie for, then. But I must make some sound, or movement; for when I draw my hands away, she is awake, and watg. I know that she is watg, though the bed is so dark.

    Go to sleep, she says. Her voice is thick.

    I feel my legs, very bare inside my gown. I feel the point at which they join. I feel the words, still swarming. The warmth of her limbs es ing, ing through the fibres of the bed.

    I say, Im afraid . . .

    Then her breathing ges. Her voice grows clearer, kinder. She yawns. What is it? she says. She rubs her eye. She pushes the hair back from her brow. If she were any girl but Sue! If she were Agnes! If she were a girl in a book—!

    Girls love easily, there. That is their point.

    Hip, lip and tongue—

    Do you think me good? I say.

    Good, miss?

    She does. It felt like safety, onow it feeis like a trap. 1 say, I wish— I wish you would tell me—

    Tell you what, miss?

    Tell me. Tell me a way to save you. A way to save myself. The room is perfectly black. Hip, lip—

    Girls love easily, there.

    I wish, I say, I wish you would tell me what it is a wife must do, on her wedding-night

    And at first, it is easy. After all, this is how it is done, in my uncles books: two girls, one wise and one unknowing . .. He will want, she says, to kiss you. He will want to embrace you. It is easy. I say my part, and she—with a little prompting—says hers. The words sink back upon their pages. It is easy, it is easy .. .

    Then she rises above me and puts her mouth to mine.

    I have felt, before, the pressure of a gentlemans still, dry lips against my gloved hand, my cheek. I have suffered Richards wet, insinuating kisses upon my palm. Her lips are cool, smooth, damp: they fit themselves imperfectly to mine, but then grow warmer, damper. Her hair falls against my face. I ot see her, I  only feel her, and taste her. She tastes of sleep, slightly sour. Too sour. I part my lips—to breathe, or to swallow, or perhaps to move away; but ihing or swallowing or moving I only seem to draw her into my mouth. Her lips part, also. Her tongue es between them and touches mine.

    And at that, I shudder, or quiver. For it is like the finding out of something raw, the troubling of a wound, a nerve. She feels me jolt, and draws away—but slowly, slowly and unwillingly, so that

    our damp mouths seem to g together and, as they part, to tear. She holds herself above me. I feel the rapid beating of a heart, and suppose it my own. But it is hers. Her breath es, fast. She has begun, very lightly, to tremble.

    Then I catch the excitement of her, the amazement of her.

    Do you feel it? she says. Her voice sounds strangely in the absolute darkness. Do you feel it?

    I do. I feel it as a falling, a dropping, a trig, like sand from a bulb of glass. Then I move; and I am not dry, like sand. I am wet. I am running, like water, like ink.

    I begin, like her, to shake.

    Dont be frightened, she says. Her voice has a catch. I move again, but she moves, too, she es o me, and my flesh gives a leap, to hers. She is trembling, worse than before. She is trembling, from the closeness of me! She says, Think more of Mr Rivers.—I think of Richard, watg. She says again, Dont be frightened.—But it is she who seems frightened. Her voice still has its catch. She kisses me again. Then she raises her hand and I feel the tips of her fingers flutter against my face.

    Do you see? she says. It is easy, it is easy. Think more of him. He will want— He will want to touch you.

    To touch me?

    Only touch you, she says. The fluttering hand moves lower. Only touch you. Like this. Like this.

    Whes up my nightgown and reaches between my legs, we both grow still. When her hand moves again, her fingers no longer flutter: they have grow, and slide, and in sliding seem, like her lips as they rub upon mio qui and draw me, to gather me, out of the darkness, out of my natural shape. I thought I longed for her, before. Now I begin to feel a longing so great, so sharp, I fear it will never be assuaged. I think it will mount, and mount, and make me mad, or kill me. Yet her hand moves slowly, still. She whispers. How soft you are! How warm! I want— The hand moves even slower. She begins to press. I catch my breath. That makes her hesitate, and then press harder. At last she presses so hard I feel the

    giving of my flesh, I feel her inside me. I think I cry out. She does not hesitate now, however, but es o me and puts her hips about my thigh; then presses again. So slight she is!—but her hip is sharp, her hand is blunt, she leans, she pushes, she moves her hips and hand as if to a rhythm, a time, a quii. She reaches. She reaches so far, she catches the life, the shudderi of me: soon I seem to be nowhere but at the points at which my flesh is gripped by hers. And then, Oh, there! she says. Just there! Oh, there!—I am breaking, shattering, bursting out of her hand. She begins to weep. Her tears e upon my face. She puts her mouth to them. You pearl, she says, as she does it. Her voice is broken. You pearl.

    I dont know how long we lie, then. She sinks beside me, with her face against my hair. She slowly draws back her fingers. My thigh is wet from where she has leaned and moved upohe feathers of the mattress have yielded beh us, the bed is close and high and hot. She puts back the blahe night is still deep, the room still black. Our breaths still e fast, our hearts beat loud—faster, and louder, they seem to me, ihiing silence; and the bed, the room—the house!—seem filled with echoes of our voices, our whispers and cries.

    I ot see her. But after a moment she finds my hand and presses it, hard, then takes it to her mouth, kisses my fingers, lies with my palm beh her cheek. I feel the weight and shape of the bones of her face. I feel her blink. She does not speak. She closes her eyes. Her face grows heavy. She shivers, ohe heat is rising from her, like a st. I read draw the bla up again, and lay it gently about her.

    Everything, I say to myself, is ged. I think I was dead, before. Now she has touched the life of me, the quie; she has put back my flesh and opened me up. Everything is ged. I still feel her, inside me. I still feel her, moving upon my thigh. I imagine her waking, meeting my gaze. I think, I will tell her, then. I will say, &quot;I meant to cheat you. I ot cheat you now. This was Richards plot. We  make it ours.&quot;—We  make it ours, I think; or else, we  give it up entirely. I need only escape from Briar: she

    help me do that—shes a thief, and clever. We  make our ow way to London, find money for ourselves . . .

    So I calculate and plan, while she lies slumbering with her face upon my hand. My heart beats hard again. I am filled, as with colour ht, with a sense of the life we will have, together. Then I also sleep. And in sleeping I suppose I must move away from her—or she must move, from me—and then she must wake, with the day, and rise: for when I open my eyes she has gohe bed is cool. I hear her in her own room, splashing water. I rise up from my pillow, and my nightgoes at my breast: she has uhe ribbons, in the dark. I move my legs. I am wet, still wet, from the sliding and the pressing of her hand.

    You pearl, she said.

    Then she es, as my gaze. My heart leaps within me.

    She looks away.

    I think her only awkward, at first. I think her shy and self-scious. She goes silently about the room, taking out my petticoats and gown. I stand, so she may wash and dress me. Now she will speak, I think. But, she does not. And when she sees the blush upon my breast, the marks left by her mouth, the dampness between my legs, it seems to me that she shudders. Only then do I begin to grow afraid. She calls me to the glass. I watch her face. It seems queer in refle, crooked and wrong. She puts the pins to my hair, but keeps her eyes all the time on her own uain hands. I think, She is ashamed.

    So then, I speak.

    What a thick sleep I had, I say, very softly. Didnt I?

    Her eyelids flutter. You did, she answers. No dreams.

    No dreams, save one, I say. But that was a—a sweet one. I think you were in it, Sue . . .

    She colours; and I watch her rising blush and feel, again, the pressure of her mouth against mihe drawing of our fierce, imperfect kisses, the pushing of her hand. I meant to cheat her. I ot cheat her, now. I am not what you think, I will say. You think me good. I am not good. But I might, with you, begin to try to be. This was his plot. We  make it ours—

    In your dream? she says at last, moving from me. I dont think so, miss. Not me. I should say, Mr Rivers. Look! There he is. His cigarette almost smoked. You will miss him— She falters once; but then goes on, You will miss him, if you wait.

    I sit dazed for a moment, as if struck by her hand; then I rise, go lifelessly to the window, watch Richard walk, smoke his cigarette, put back the tumbling hair from his brow. But I keep at the glass, long after he has left the lawn and gone in to my uncle. I would see my face, if the day were dark enough; I see it anyway, though: my hollowing cheek, my lips, too plump, too pink—plumper and pihan ever now, from the pressing of Sues mouth. I remember my uncle—I have touched your lip with poison, Maud—and Barbara, starting away. I remember Mrs Stiles, grinding lavender soap against my tohen wiping and wiping her hands upon her apron.

    Everything has ged. Nothing has ged, at all. She has put back my flesh; but flesh will close, will seal, will scar and harden. I hear her go to my drawing-room; I watch her sit, cover up her face. I wait, but she does not look—I think she will never look holy at me, again. I meant to save her. Now I see very clearly what will happen, if I do—if I draw back from Richards plot. He will go from Briar, with her at his side. Why should she stay? She will go, and I shall be left—to my uo the books, to Mrs Stiles, to some new meek and bruisable girl ... I think of my life—of the hours, the mihe days that have made it up; of the hours, the minutes and days that stretch before me, still to be lived. I think of how they will be—without Richard, without money, without London, without liberty. Without Sue.

    And so you see it is love—not s, not malice; only love—that makes me harm her, in the end.

 Chapter Eleven

    We leave, just as lanned, on the last day of April. /y 1/ Richards stay is plete. My uncles prints are mounted and bound: he takes me to view them, as a sort of treat.

    Fine work, he says. You think, Maud? Hmm?

    Yes, sir.

    Do you look?

    Yes, Uncle.

    Yes. Fine work. I believe I shall send for Hawtrey and Huss. I shall have them e— week? What do you say? Shall we make an occasion of it?

    I do not answer. I am thinking of the dining-room, the drawing-room—and me, in some other shadowy place, far off. He turns to Richard.

    Rivers, he says, should you like to e back, as a guest, with Hawtrey?

    Richard bows, looks sorry. I fear, sir, I shall be occupied elsewhere.

    Unfortunate. You hear that, Maud? Most unfortunate . . .

    He unlocks his door. Mr Way and Charles are going about the gallery with Richards bags. Charles is rubbing his eyes with his sleeve.—Get on with you! says Mr Way savagely, kig out with his foot. Charles lifts his head, sees us emerging from my uncles room—sees my uncle, I suppose—and shakes in a sort of vulsion, and runs. My uncle also shakes, then.

    Do you see, Rivers, the torments to which I am exposed? Mr Way, I hope you will catch that boy and whip him!

    I will, sir, says Mr Way.

    Richard looks at me, and smiles. I do not smile back. And when, at the steps, he takes my hand, my fingers sit quite nervelessly against his own. Good-bye, he says. I say nothing. He turns to my uncle: Mr Lilly. Farewell to you, sir!

    A handsome man, my uncle says, as the trap is drawn from sight. Hmm, Maud? What, are you silent? Shant you like it, to have to return to our solitary ways?

    We go bato the house. Mr ulls closed the swollen door, and the hall grows dark. I climb the stairs at my uncles side, as I once, as a girl, climbed them with Mrs Stiles. How many times, I think, have I mouhem, sihen? How many times has my heel struck this spot, that spot? How many slippers, how many strait gowns, how many gloves, have I outgrown or outworn? How many voluptuous words have I silently read?—how many mouthed, fentlemen?

    The stairs, the slippers and gloves, the words, the gentlemen, will all remain, though I escape. Will they? I think again of the rooms of my uncles house: the dining- and drawing-room, the library. I think of the little crest I once picked out in the paint that covers the library windows: I try to imagi, eyeless. I remember how once I woke and watched my room seem to gather itself together out of the dark, and thought, / shall never escape! Now I know that I shall. But I think that Briar will hauoo.— Or else, I will haunt it, while living out some dim and partial life beyond its walls.

    I think of the ghost I shall make: a , monotonous ghost,

    walking for ever on soft-soled feet, through a broken house, to the pattern of a carpets.

    But perhaps, after all, I am a ghost already. Fo to Sue and she shows me the gowns and linens she means for us to take, the jewels she means to shihe bags she will fill; but she does it all without meeting my gaze; and I watch, and say nothing. I am more aware of her hands than of the objects she takes up; feel the stir of her breath, see the movement of her lip, but her words slip from my memory the moment she has said them. At last she has nothing more to show. We must only wait. We take our lunch. We walk to my mrave. I stare at the stone, feeling nothing. The day is mild, and damp: our shoes, as we walk, press dew from the springing greeh and mark owns with streaks of mud.

    I have surrendered myself to Richards plan, as I once gave myself to my uhe plot, the flight—they seem fired, now, not so much by my wants as by his. I am empty of want. I sit at my supper, I eat, I read; I return to Sue a her dress me as she likes, take wine when she offers it, stand at the window at her side. She moves fretfully, from foot to foot. Look at the moon, she says softly, hht it is! Look at the shadows on the grass.—What time is it? Not eleveo think of Mr Rivers, somewhere upoer, now ...&quot;

    There is only ohing I mean to do, before I go: one deed—oerrible deed—the vision of which has risen, to goad and e, through all the bitten-des, the dark and uneasy sleeps, of my life at Briar; and now, as the hour of our flight nears, as the house falls silent, still, unsuspeg, I do it. Sue leaves me, to look over s. I hear her, unfastening buckles.—That is all I wait for.

    I go stealthily from the room. I know my way, I do not need a lamp, and my dark dress hides me. I go to the head of the stairs, cross quickly the broken carpets of moonlight that the windows there throw upon the floor. Then I pause, and listen. Silence. So then I go on, into the corridor which faces mine, along a path which is the mirror of the path that has led from my own rooms. At the first door I pause again, and listen again, to be sure that all is still within.

    This is the door to my uncles rooms. I have never entered here, before. But, as I guess, the handle and hinges are kept greased, and turn without a sound. The rug is a thie, and makes a whisper of my step.

    His drawing-room is even darker, and seems smaller, than mine: he has hangings upon the walls, and more book-presses. I dont look at them. I go to his dressing-room door, put my ear to the wood; take the handle and turn it. One inch, two ihree.—I hold my breath, my hand upon my heart. No sound. I push the door further, stand and listen again. If he stirs, I will turn and go. Does he move? For a sed there is nothing. Still I wait, uain. Then es the soft, even rasp of his breathing.

    He has his bed-curtains pulled close but keeps a light, as I do, upon a table: this seems curious to me, I should never have supposed him to be nervous of the dark. But the dim light helps me. Without moving from my place beside the door, I look about me; and at last see the two things I have e to take. On his dressing-stand, beside his jug of water: his watch- with, upon it, the key to his library, bound in faded velvet; and his razor.

    I go quickly and take them up—the  uncurling softly, I feel it slither against my glove. If it should fall—! It does not fall. The door-key swings like a pendulum. The razor is heavier than I expect, the blade is free of its clasp, at an angle, showing its edge. I pull it a little freer, and turn it to the light: it must be sharp, for what I want it for. I think it is sharp enough. I lift my head. In the glass above the mantel, picked out against the shadows of the room, I see myself—my hands: in one a key, iher a blade. I might pass firl in an allegory. fidence Abused.

    Behihe drapes to my uncles bed do not quite meet. In the space between them a shaft of light—so weak it is hardly light, but rather a lessening of darkness—leads to his face. I have never seen him sleep before. In form he seems slight, like a child. The bla is drawn to his , uncreased, pulled tight. His lips let out his breath in a puff. He is dreaming—black-letter dreams, perhaps, or pica, morocco, calf. He is ting spines. His spectacles sit ly, as if with folded arms, oable beside his head. Beh

    the lashes of one of his soft eyes there is a gleaming line of moisture. The razor is warming in my hand . . .

    But this is not that kind of story. Not yet. I stand and watch him sleep for almost a minute; and then I leave him. I go as I have e—carefully, silently. I go to the stairs, and from there to the library, and onside that room I lock the door at my bad light a lamp. My heart is beating hardest, now. I am queasy with fear and anticipation. But time is rag, and I ot wait. I cross to my uncles shelves and unfasten the glass before the presses. I begin with The Curtain Drawn Up, the book he gave me first: I take it, and open it, a upon his desk. Then I lift the razrip it tight, and fully unclasp it. The blade is stiff, but springs the last inch. It is its nature to cut, after all.

    Still, it is hard—it is terribly hard, I almost ot do it—to put the metal for the first time to the  and naked paper. I am almost afraid the book will shriek, and so discover me. But it does not shriek. Rather, it sighs, as if in longing for its own laceration; and when I hear that, my cuts bee swifter and more true.

    When I return to Sue she is at the window, wringing her hands. Midnight has sounded. She supposed me lost. But she is too relieved to se. Heres your cloak, she says. Fasten it up now, quick. Take your.99ｌib. bag.—Not that ohat ooo heavy for you. Now, we must go. She thinks me nervous. She puts her fio my mouth. She says, Be steady Theakes my hand and leads me through the house.

    Soft as a thief, she goes. She tells me where I may walk. She does not know that I have retly stood, light as a shadow, and watched my uncle sleep. But then, we go by the servants way, and the naked passages and stairs are strao me, all this part of the house is strao me. She keeps her hand in miil we reach the basement door. Thes down her bag, so she may smear the key and the bolts with grease, to make them turn. She catches my eye and winks, like a boy. My heart aches in my breast.

    Then the door is opened and she takes me into the night; and the park is ged, the house seems queer—for of course, I have never

    before seen it at su hour as this, I have only stood at my window and gazed out. If I stood there now, would I see myself running, Sue tugging my hand? Would I seem so bleached of depth and colour, like the lawn, the trees, the stones and stumps of ivy? For a sed I hesitate, turn and watch the glass, quite sure that, if I only wait, I will see my face. Then I look at the other windows. Will no-one wake, and e, and call me back?

    No-one wakes, no-one calls. Sue pulls at my hand again, and I turn and follow. I have the key to the gate in the wall: when we are through and the lock is fast again I let it fall among the rushes. The sky is clear. We stand in shadow, saying nothing—two Thisbes, awaiting a Pyramus. The moon makes the river half silver, half deepest black.

    He keeps to the black part. The boat sits low upoer—a dark-hulled boat, slender, rising at the prow. The dark boat of my dreams. I watch it e, feel Sues hand turn in mihen step from her, take the rope he casts, let him guide me to my seat, uing. She es beside me, staggering, her balance all gone. He braces the boat against the bank with a single oar, and as she sits, we turn, and the current takes us.

    No-one speaks. No-one moves, save Richard as he rows. We glide, softly, in silence, into our dark and separate hells.

    What follows? I know that the journey upon the river is a smooth ohat I should like to keep upon the boat, but am made to leave it and mount a horse. I should be afraid of the horse, at any other time; but I sit lifelessly upon it now, letting it bear me—as, I think, I would let it throw me, if it chose to. I remember the church of flint, the stalks of hoy, my own white gloves—my hand, that is bared then passed from o of fio ahen bruised by the thrusting of a ring. I am made to say certain words, that I have now fotten. I remember the minister, in a surplice smudged with grey. I do not recall his face. I know that Richard kisses me. I remember a book, the handling of a pen, the writing of my name. I do not remember the walk from the church: what I recall  is a room, Sue loosening my gown; and then a pillow, coarse against my

    cheek; a bla, coarser; and weeping. My hand is bare and has that ring upon it, still. Sues fingers slip from mine.

    You must be different now, she says, and I turn my face.

    When I look again, she has left me. In her place stands Richard. He keeps for a sed before the door, his eyes on mihes out his breath, puts the back of his hand to his mouth to stifle laughter.

    Oh, Maud, he says quietly, shaking his head. He wipes his beard and lips. Our wedding-night, he says; and laughs again.

    I watch him and do not speak, the blas pulled high before my breast. I am sober, now. I am quite awake. When he falls quiet, I hear the house beyond him: the stairs expand, throw off the pressure of his step. A mouse, or bird, moves in the space above the rafters. The sounds are wrong. The thought must show in my face.

    Its queer for you, here, he says, ing closer to me. Dont mind it. You shall be at London soon. Theres more life there. Think of that. I say nothing. Will you speak? Hmm, Maud? e, you  be fey; not now, with me. Our wedding-night, Maud! He has e to my side. He raises his hand and grips the head-board above my pillow and shakes it, hard, until the legs of the bed lurd grind against the floor.

    I y eyes. The shuddering tinues another moment, then the bed grows still. But he keeps his arm above me, and I feel him watg. I feel the bulk of him—seem to see the darkness of him, even through my eyelids. I sense him ge. The mouse or bird still moves in the ceiling of the room, and I this back his head, to follow its path. Then the house falls quiet, audies me again.

    And then his breath es, quick, against my cheek. He has blown in my face. I open my eyes. Hey, he says softly. His look is strange. Dont say youre afraid. He swallows. Then he brings back his arm from the head-board, slowly. I flinch, thinking he might strike me. But he does not do that. His gaze moves over my face, theles at the hollow of my throat. He looks, as if fasated. How fast your heart beats, he whispers. He lowers his hand, as if he means to test, with his fihe rag of my blood.

    Touch it, I say. Touch it, and die. I have poison in me.

    His hand stops, an inch from my throat. I hold his gaze, not blinking. He straightens. His mouth gives a twitch, then curls in s.

    Did you think I wanted you? he says. Did you? He almost hisses the words—for of course, he ot speak too loudly, in case Sue should hear. He moves away, agitatedly smoothing his hair behind his ears. A bag lies in his path, and he kicks it. God damn it, he says. He takes off his coat, then tugs at the link in a cuff, begins to work savagely at one of his sleeves. Must you stare so? he says, as he bares his arm. Havent I already told you, you are safe? If you think I am any gladder than you, to be married— He es back to the bed. I must act glad, however, he says moodily. And this is a part of asses fladness, in marriage. Had you fotten?

    He has drawn back the bla, exposing the sheet that covers the mattress, at the level of my hips. Move over, he says. I do. He sits, and awkwardly turns. He reaches into the pocket of his trousers and draws something out. A pen-knife.

    I see it, and think at ony uncles razor. It was in a different life, however, that I went stealthily through that sleeping house, cut the pages of books. Now I watch as Richard puts his nail to the groove of the knife and eases free the blade. It is spotted black. He looks distastefully at it, then lays it against his arm. But he does it uainly, fling wheal touches. Then he lowers the knife.

    God damn it, he says again. He smooths his whiskers, his hair. He catches my eye. Dont look, so uselessly. Have you no blood about you, to save me the pain? None of those—courses, that women suffer? I say nothing. His mouth twists again. Well, that is like you. I should have thought that, being obliged to bleed, you might as well bleed to some advantage; but, no . . .

    Do you mean, I say, to insult me, in every possible way?

    Be quiet, he answers. We are still speaking in whispers. This is for both ood. I dont see you  up your arm to the k once, I offer it. He waves it away. No, no, he says. I shall do it,

    in a moment. He draws in his breath, moves the blade further down his arm, rests it in one of the creases at the base of his palm, where the flesh is hairless. He pauses again, takes another breath; slices, quickly. Good Christ! he says, wing. A little blood springs to the cut—it seems dark, in the dle-light, upon the white heel of his hand. He lets it fall to the bed. There is not much of it. He presses with his thumb at the skin of his wrist and palm, and then it falls faster. He does not catch my eye.

    After a moment, however, he says quietly: Do you suppose that enough?

    I study his face. Dont you know? No, I do not know. But—

    But what? He blinks. You mean Agnes, I suppose. Dont flatter her. There are more ways of shaming a virtuous girl, than that one. You ought to know.

    The blood still feebly runs. He curses. I think of Agnes, showing me her red and swollen mouth. I turn away from him, in a sort of siess. e, Maud, he says then, tell me before I fall in a swoon. You must have read of such things. I am sure your uncle must have some entry on it in his damn Index—doesnt he? Maud? I look agaiantly, at the spreading drops of blood; and I nod. As a final gesture he puts his wrist to them, and smears them. Then he frowns at his cut. His cheek is quite white. He makes a face. How ill a man may grow, he says, from the sight of the spilling of a little of his own blood. What monsters you females must be, to ehis, month upon month. No wonder you are proo madness. See how the flesh parts? He shows me his hand. I think after all I cut too deep. That was your fault, provoking me. Have you brandy? I think a little brandy would restore me.

    He has drawn out his handkerchief, and now presses it to his arm. I say, I have no brandy.

    No brandy. What have you, then? Some draught or other? e, I see by your face that you do. He looks about him. Where is it kept?

    I hesitate; but now he has , the desire for drops begins to

    rs creeping way about my heart and limbs. In my leather bag, I say. He brings the bottle to me, draws out its stopper, puts his o it, grimaces. Bring me a glass, also, I say. He finds a cup, adds a little dusty water.

    Not like that, for me, he says, as I let the medie slip. That will serve for you. I want it quicker. He takes the bottle from me, uncovers his cut, lets a single drop fall into the parted flesh. It stings. He winces. Where it runs, he licks it. Then he sighs, half closing h<bdi></bdi>is eyes, watg me as I drink then shiver then lean back upon my pillow, the cup at my breast.

    At length, he smiles. He laughs. &quot;The Fashionable Couple on their Wedding-Night,&quot; he says. They would write a n on us, in the London papers.

    I shiver again, draw the blas higher; the sheet falls, c the smears of blood. I reach for the bottle. He reaches it first, however, and puts it out of my grasp.

    No, no, he says. Not while you keep so trary. I shall have it, tonight. He puts it in his pocket, and I am too weary to try to take it from him. He stands and yawns, wipes his face, rubs hard at his eyes. How tired I am! he says. It is past three oclock, do you know? I say nothing, and he shrugs. But he lingers at the foot of the bed, looking down, in a hesitating manner, at the place at my side; then he sees my face, and pretends to shudder.

    I should not be astonished, after all, he says, to wake to the grip of your fingers at my throat. No, I shall not risk it.

    He steps to the fire, wets his thumb and finger upon his tongue, puts out the dle; thes in a huddle in the arm-chair and makes a bla of his coat. He swears against the cold, the pose, the angles of the chair, for perhaps a minute. But he sleeps, soohan I do.

    And when he does, I rise, go quickly to the window, put the curtain back. The moon is still bright, and I dont want to lie in darkness. But after all, every surface that takes up the silver light is strao me; and when once I reach, to put my fio some mark upon the wall, the mark and the wall in taking my touch seem only to grow stranger. My cloak and gown and linen are closed in

    the press. My bags are shut. I look, and look, for something of mine; and see only at last, in the shadow of the wash-hand stand, my shoes. I go to them, and stoop, and place my hands upohen I draw bad almost straighten; then touch them again.

    Then I lie in the bed, and listen hard for the sounds I am used to—for bells and growling levers. There are only those meaningless he yawning boards, the creeping bird or mouse. I put back my head and gaze at the wall behind me. Beyond it lies Sue. If she turned in her bed, if she said my name, I think I would hear it. She might make any sound, any at all—I would catch it, I am certain I would.

    She makes no sound. Richard shifts in his chair. The moonlight creeps across the floor. In time, I sleep. I sleep and dream of Briar. But the passages of the house are not as I recall them. I am late for my uncle, and lost.

    She es each m, after that, to wash me, to dress me, to set food before me, to take away my untouched plate; but, as in the last of our days at Briar, she never meets my gaze. The room is small. She sits near me, but rarely do we speak. She sews. I play at cards— the two of hearts with the crease of my heel upon it, rough beh my naked finger. Richard keeps all day from the room. At night, he curses. He curses the filthy lanes of the try, that muddy his boots. He curses my silence, my strangeness. He curses the wait. Above all, he curses the angular arm-chair.

    See here, he says, my shoulder. You see it? It is rising from its socket—it is quite thrown out. I shall be deformed, in a week. As for these creases— He angrily smooths his trousers. I should have brought Charles, after all. At this rate I shall arrive at London only to be laughed off its streets.

    London, I think. The word means nothing to me now.

    He rides out, every other day, for news of my uncle. He smokes so many cigarettes the stain on his scorched forefinger spreads to the finger beside it. Now and thes me take a dose of my draught; but he always keeps hold of the bottle.

    Very good, he says, watg me drink. Not much longer, now.

    Why, how thin and pale youve grown!—and Sue grows sleeker by the hour, like one of Mother Creams black-faced sows. Get her into your best gown tomorrow, will you?

    I do. I will do anything, now, t ao our long wait. I will pretend fear, and nervousness, and weeping, while he leans to caress or chide me. I will do it, not looking at Sue—or else, looking at her slyly, desperately, to see if she colours or seems ashamed. She never does. Her hands, that I remember sliding upon me, pressing, turning, opening me up—her hands, wheouch me noerfectly lifeless and white. Her face is closed. She only waits, as we do, for the ing of the doctors.

    We wait—I ot say how long. Two weeks, or three. At last: They e tomorrow, Richard tells me one night; and the m: They e today. You remember?

    I have woken from terrible dreams.

    I ot see them, I say. You must send them back. They must e aime.

    Doiresome, Maud.

    He stands and dresses, fastening his collar, his ie. His coat lies ly on the bed.

    I wohem! I say.

    You will, he answers; for in seeing them y this thing to pletion. You hate it here. Now is our time to leave.

    I am too nervous.

    He does not answer. He turns, to raise a brush to his head. I lean and seize his coat—find the pocket, the bottle of drops—but he sees, es quickly to me and plucks it from my hand.

    Oh, no, he says, as he does it. I wont have you half in a dream—or risk you muddling the dose, and so spoiling everything! Oh, no. You must be quite clear in your mind.

    He returns the bottle to the pocket. When I reach again, he dodges.

    Let me have it, I say. Richard, let me have it. One drop only, I swear. My lips jump about the words. He shakes his head, wipes at the nap of the coat to remove the impression of my fingers.

    Not yet, he says. Be good. Work for it.

    I ot! I shant be calm, without a dose of it.

    You shall try, for my sake. For our sake, Maud.

    Damn you!

    Yes, yes, damn us all, damn us all. He sighs; theurns to the

    brushing of his hair. When after a moment I sink back, he catches

    my eye.

    Why throw such a tantrum, hey? he says, almost kindly. And then: You are calmer, now? Very good. You know what to do, when they see you? Have Sue make you , no more than that. Be modest. Weep if you must, a little. You are sure what to say?

    I am, despite myself; for lahis, many times. I wait, then nod. Of course, he says. He pats at his pocket, at the bottle of drops. Think of London, he says. There are druggists on every street er, there.

    My mouth trembles in s. You think, I say, I shall still want my medie, in London?

    The words sound weak, even to my ears. He turns his head, saying nothing, perhaps suppressing a smile. Theakes up his pen-knife and stands at the fire and s his nails—now and then giving a flick of the blade, to cast slivers of dirt, fastidiously, into the flames.

    He takes them first to talk with Sue. Of course, they suppose her his wife, turned mad, thinking herself a servant, speaking in the manner of a maid, keeping to a maids room. I hear the creaking of the stairs and floorboards beh their boots. I hear their voices— low, monotonous—but not their words. Sues voice I do not hear at all. I sit upon the bed until they e, and then I stand and curtsey. Susan, says Richard quietly. My wifes maid. They nod. I say nothing, yet. But I think my look must be strange. I see them studying me. Richard also watches. Then he es close.

    A faithful girl, he says to the doctors. Her strength has been sadly over-taxed, these past two weeks. He makes me walk from the bed to the arm-chair, puts me in the light of the window. Sit here,

    he says gently, in your mistresss chair. Be calm, now. These gentlemen only wish to ask you a number of trifling questions. You must ahem holy.

    He presses my hand. I think he does it to reassure or to warhen I feel his fingers close about one of mine. I still wear my wedding-ring. He draws it free and holds it, hidden, against his palm.

    Very good, says one of the doctors, more satisfied now. The other makes notes in a book. I watch him turn a page and, suddenly, long for paper. Very good. We have seen your mistress. You do well to think of her fort ah for—I am sorry to tell you this— we fear she is ill. Very ill indeed. You know she believes her o be your name, her history ohat resembles yours? You know that?

    Richard watches.

    Yes, sir, I say, in a whisper.

    And your name is Susan Smith?

    Yes, sir.

    And you were maid to Mrs Rivers—Miss Lilly, as was—in her uncles house, of Briar, before her marriage?

    I nod.

    And before that—where was your plaot with a family named Dunraven, at the supposed address of Whelk Street, Mayfair?

    No, sir. I never heard of them. They are all Mrs Riverss fancy.

    I speak, as a servant might. And I name, relutly, some other house and family—some family of Richards acquaintance, who might be relied on to provide the history we need, if the doctors think to seek them out. We do not think they will, however.

    The doctor nods again. And Mrs Rivers, he says. You speak of her &quot;fancy&quot;. When did such fancies begin?

    I swallow. Mrs Rivers has often seemed strange, I say quietly. The servants at Briar would speak of her as of a lady not quite right, in the brain. I believe her mother was mad, sir.

    Now, now, says Richard smoothly, interrupting. The doctors dont want to hear the gossip of servants. Go on with your observations, only.

    Yes, sir, I say. I gaze at the floor. The boards are scuffed, there are splinters rising from the wood, thick as needles.

    And Mrs Riverss marriage, says the doctor. How did that affect her?

    It was that, sir, I say, which made the ge in her. Before that time, she had seemed to love Mr Rivers; and we had all at Briar supposed his care, which was—I catch Richards eye—so good, sir!—we had all supposed it would lift her out of herself. Then, since her wedding-night, she has started up very queer ...&quot;

    The doctor looks at his colleague. You hear, he says, how well the at matches Mrs Riverss own? It is quite remarkable!—as if, in making a burden of her life, she seeks to hand that burden to another, better able to bear it. She has made a fi of herself! He returns to me. A fi, indeed, he says thoughtfully. Tell me this, Miss Smith: does your mistress care for books? for reading?

    I meet his gaze, but my throat seems to close, or be splintered, like the boards on the floor. I ot answer. Richard speaks in my behalf. My wife, he says, was born to a literary life. Her uncle, who raised her, is a man dedicated to the pursuit of learning, and saw to her education as he might have seen to a sons. Mrs Riverss first passion was books.

    There you have it! says the doctor. Her uncle, an admirable gentleman I dont doubt. But the over-exposure of girls to literature— The founding of womens colleges— His brow is sleek with sweat. We are raising a nation of brain-cultured women. Your wifes distress, Im afraid to say, is part of a wider malaise. I fear for the future of our race, Mr Rivers, I may tell you now. And her wedding-night, you say, the start of this most ret bout of insanity? Could that—he drops his voice meaningfully, and exges a glah the doctor who writes—be plainer? He taps at his lip. I saw how she shrank from my touch, when I felt for the pulse at her wrist. I oo, that she wears ne ring.

    Richard starts into life at the words, and pretends to draw something from his pocket. They say fortune favours villains.

    Here it is, he says gravely, holding out the yellow band. She put

    it from her, with a curse.—For she speaks like a servant now, and thinks nothing of mouthing filthy words. God knows where she learhem! He bites at his lip. You might imagihe sensations that produced, sir, in my breast. He puts his hand to his eyes, and sits heavily upon the bed; then rises, as if in horror. This bed! he says hoarsely. Our marriage-bed, I thought it. To think my wife would rather the room of a servant, a pallet of straw—! He shudders. Thats enough, I think. No more. But he is a man in love with his uery.

    A wretched case, says the doctor. But we will work on your wife, you may be sure, to shake her of her unnatural fancy—

    Unnatural? says Richard. He shudders again. His look grows strange. Ah, sir, he says, you dont know all. There is something else. I had hoped to keep it from you. I feel now, I ot.

    Indeed? says the doctor. The other pauses, his pencil raised.

    Richard wets his mouth; and all at once I know what he means to say, and quickly turn my face to his. He marks it. He speaks, before I .

    Susan, he says, you do well to feel shame in behalf of your mistress. You need feel none, however, in behalf of yourself. No guilt attaches to you. You did nothing to invite or ence the gross attentions my wife, in her madness, attempted to for you—

    He bites at his hand. The doctors stare, then turn to gaze at me.

    Miss Smith, says the first, leaning closer, is this true?

    I think of Sue. I think of her, not as she must be now, in the room beyond the wall—satisfied to have betrayed me, glad to suppose herself about to return at last to her home, the dark thieves den, in London. I think of her holding herself above me, her hair let down, You pearl. . .

    Miss Smith?

    I have begun to weep.

    Surely, says Richard, ing to me, putting his hand heavily upon my shoulder, surely these tears speak for themselves? Do we o he unhappy passion? Must we oblige Miss Smith to rehearse the words, the artful poses—the caresses—to which my distracted wife has made her subject? Arent we gentlemen?

    Of course, says the doctor quickly, moving back. Of course. Miss Smith, yrief does you credit. You need not fear for your safety, now. You need not fear for the safety of your mistress. Her care will soon be our , not yours. Then we shall keep her, and cure her of all her ills. Mr Rivers, you uand—a case such as this—the treatment may well be a lengthy one . . .?

    They rise. They have brought papers, and look for a surfa which to put them out. Richard clears the dressing-table of brushes and pins and they lay them there, then sign: a paper each. I dont watch them do it, but hear the grinding of the pen. I hear them moving together, to shake each others hands. The staircase thunders as they go down. I keep in my seat beside the window. Richard stands ih to the house while they drive off.

    Then he es back. He closes the door. He steps to me and tosses the wedding-ring into my lap. He rubs his hands together and almost capers.

    You devil, I say, without passion, wiping the tears from my cheek.

    He snorts. He moves to the bay chair and puts his hands to my head, one hand to either side of my face; then tilts it batil azes meet. Look at me, he says, and tell me, holy, that you dont admire me.

    I hate you.

    Hate yourself, then. Were alike, you and I. More alike than you know. You think the world ought to love us, for the kinks in the fibres of our hearts? The world ss us. Thank God it does! There was never a profit to be got from love; from s, however, you may twist riches, as filthy water may be wrung from a cloth. You know it is true. You are like me. I say it again: hate me, hate yourself.

    His hands are warm upon my face, at least. I y eyes.

    I say, I do.

    Then Sue es from her room, to knock upon our door. He keeps his pose, but calls for her to enter.

    Look here, he says when she does, his voice quite ged, at your mistress. Dont you think her eyes a little brighter . . .? We leave  day, for the madhouse.

    She es to dress me, for the final time.

    Thank you, Sue, I say, in the old soft way, each time she hooks a button or draws a lace. I wear, still, the gown in which I left Briar, that is spotted with mud and river-water. She wears my gown of silk—blue silk, against which the white of her wrists and throat is turo the colour of cream, and the browns of her hair and eyes are made rich. She has grown handsome. She moves about the room, taking up my linen, my shoes, my brushes and pins, and putting them carefully in bags. Two bags, there are: oined for London, the other for the madhouse—the first, as she supposes, for herself; the sed for me. It is hard to watch her make her choices—to see her frown over a petticoat, a pair of stogs or shoes, to know she is thinking, These will surely be good enough for mad people and doctors. This she ought to take, in case the nights are cool. Now, that and those (the bottle of drops, my gloves) she must have.—I move them, when she leaves me, and place them deep iher bag.

    And oher thing I put with them, that she does not know I keep: the silver thimble, from the sewing-box at Briar, with which she smoothed my poiooth.

    The coaes, soohan I think it will. Thank God, says Richard. He carries his hat. He is too tall for this low and tilting house: wheep outside, he stretches. I have kept to my room so long, however, the day feels vast to me. I walk with Sues arm gripped in mine, and at the door of the coach, when I must give it up—give it up, for ever!—I think I hesitate.

    Now, now, says Richard, taking my hand from her. No time for se.

    Then we drive. I feel it, as more than a matter of galloping horses and turning wheels. It is like an undoing of my first journey, with Mrs Stiles, from the madhouse to Briar: I put my face to the window

    as the carriage slows, and almost expect to see the house and the mothers I was snatched from. I should remember them still, I know it. But, that house was large. This one is smaller, and lighter. It has rooms for female lunatics, only. That house was set in bare earth. This one has a bed of flowers beside its door—tall flowers, with tips like spikes.

    I fall ba my seat. Richard catches my eye.

    Dont be afraid, he says.

    Theake her. He helps her into their hands, and stands before me at the door, looking out.

    Wait, I hear her say. What are you doing? Thelemelemen!—an odd and formal phrase.

    The doctors speak in soothing tones, until she begins to curse; then their voices grow hard. Richard draws back. The floor of the carriage tilts, the doorway rises, and I see her—the two mens hands upon her arms, a nurse gripping her waist. Her cloak is falling from her shoulders, her hat is tilted, her hair is tearing from its pins. Her face is red and white. Her look is wild, already.

    Her eyes are fixed on mine. I sit like a stone, until Richard takes my arm and presses, hard, upon my wrist.

    Speak, he whispers, damn you. Then I sing out, clear, meically:

    Oh! My own poor mistress! Her brown eyes—wide—with that darker fleck. Her tumbling hair. Oh! Oh! My heart is breaking!

    The cry seems t about the coach, even after Richard has swung closed the door and the driver whipped the horse into life and turned us. We do not speak. Beside Richards head is a lozenge-shaped window of milky glass, and for a moment I see her again: still struggling, lifting her arm to point or reach— Then the road makes a dip. There e trees. I take off my wedding-ring and throw it to the floor. I find, in my bag, a pair of gloves, and draw them on. Richard watches my trembling hands.

    Well— he says.

    Dont speak to me, I say, almost spitting the words. If you speak to me, I shall kill you.

    He blinks, and attempts to smile. But his mouth moves strangely and his face, behind his beard, is perfectly white. He folds his arms. He sits, first one way and then another. He crosses and uncrosses his legs. At length he takes a cigarette from his pocket, and a match, and tries to draw down the carriage window. It will not e. His hands are damp, groer, and finally slide upon the glass. Damn this! he cries then. He rises, staggers, beats upon the ceiling for the driver to stop the horse, then fumbles with the key. We have gone no more than a mile or two, but he jumps to the ground and paces, coughs. He puts his hand to the lock of springing hair at his brow, many times. I watch him.

    How like a villain, I say, wheakes his seat again, you are now.

    And how like a lady, you! he answers, with a sneer.

    Theurns his face from me, rests his head against the jolting cushion; and pretends, with twitg eye-lids, to sleep.

    My oway open. I gaze through the lozenge of glass at the road we have travelled—a winding red road, made cloudy by dust, like a thread of blood esg from my heart.

    art of our journey like this, but then must give up the asylum carriage and take a train. I have never ridden a train before. We wait at a try station. We wait at an inn, since Richard is still afraid that my uncle will have sent out men to watch for us. He has the landlord put us in a private ro<bdo>藏书网</bdo>om and briea and bread-and-butter. I will not look at the tray. The tea grows brown and cool, the bread curls. He stands at the fire and rattles the s in his pocket, then bursts out: God damn you, do you think I take food for you, for free? He eats the bread-and-butter himself. I hope I see my money soon, he says. God knows I , after three months with you and your uncle, doing what he calls a gentlemans labour, receiving wages that would barely keep a prentleman in cuffs. Wheres that damn porter? How much do they mean to swindle me of for our tickets, I wonder?

    At last a boy appears to fetch us and take s. We stand oation platform and study the rails. They shine, as if polished.

    In time they begin to purr, and then—unpleasantly, like nerves in failih—to hum. The hum bees a shriek. Therain es hurtling about the track, a plume of smoke at its head, its many doors unfolding. I keep my veil about my face. Richard hands a  to the guard, saying easily: Youll see to it, perhaps, that my wife and I are kept quite private, till London? The guard says he will; and when Richard es and takes his pla the coach across from me he is more peevish than ever.

    That I must pay a man to think me lewd, so I may sit chastely, with my own little virgin of a wife! Let me tell you now, I am keeping a separate at of the costs of this jouro charge against your share.

    I say nothing. The train has shuddered, as if beaten with hammers, and now begins to roll upon its tracks. I feel the growing speed of it, and grip the hanging strap of leather until my hand cramps and blisters in its glove.

    So the journey proceeds. It seems to me that we must cross vast distances of space.—For you will uand that my sense of distand s<cite>?</cite>pace is rather strange. We stop at a village of red-bricked houses, and then at another, very similar; and then at a third, rather larger. At every station there is what seems to me a press of people clam to board, the thud and shake of slamming doors. I am afraid the crowds will overburderain—perhaps overturn it.

    I think, I deserve to be crushed in the wreck of a train; and almost hope they do.

    They do not. The engine speeds us onward, then slows, and again there are streets and the spires of churches—more streets and spires than I have yet seen; more houses, aween them a steady traffic of cattle and vehicles and people. London! I think, with a lury heart. But Richard studies me as I gaze, and smiles unpleasantly. Your natural home, he says. We stop at the station and I see the name of it: MAIDENHEAD.

    Though we have e so swiftly we have travelled no more thay miles, and have ahirty to go. I sit, still gripping the strap, leaning close to the glass; but the station is filled with men and women—the women in groups, the men idly walking; and from

    them I shrink. Soorain gives a hiss, and gathers its bulk, and shudders bato terrible life. We leave the streets of Maidenhead. We pass through trees. Beyond the trees there are open parklands, and houses—some as great as my uncles, some greater. Here and there are cottages with pens of pigs, with garde with broken sticks for climbing beans, and hung with lines of laundry. Where the lines are full there is laundry hung from windows, from trees, on bushes, on chairs, between the shafts of broken carts—laundry everywhere, drooping and yellow.

    I keep my pose and watch it all. Look, Maud, I think. Here is your future. Heres all your liberty, unfolding like a bolt of cloth . . .

    I wonder if Sue is very mujured. I wonder what kind of place they have her in, now.

    Richard tries to see beyond my veil. Youre not weeping, are you? he says. e on, dont trouble over it still.

    I say, Dont look at me.

    Should you rather be back at Briar, with the books? You know you should not. You know you have wahis. Youll fet, soon, the manner in which you got it. Believe me, I know these things. You must only be patient. We must both be patient now. We have many weeks to pass together, before the fortune bees ours. I am sorry I spoke harshly, before. e, Maud. We shall be at London, soon. Things will seem different to you there, I assure you ...&quot;

    I do not answer. At last, with a curse, he gives it up. The day is darkening now—or rather, the sky is darkening, as we draw close to the city. There e streaks of soot upon the glass. The landscape is slowly growing meahe cottages have begun to be replaced by wooden dwellings, some with broken windows and boards. The gardens are giving way to patches of weed; soon the weed gives way to ditches, the ditches to dark als, to dreary wastes of road, to mounds of stones or soil or ashes. Still, Even ashes, I think, are a part of your freedom—and I feel, despite myself, the kindling in me of a sort of excitement. But then, the excitement bees unease. I have always supposed London a place, like a house in a park, with walls: Ive imagi rising, straight and  and solid. I have not

    supposed it would sprawl so brokenly, through villages and suburbs. Ive believed it plete: but now, as I watch, there e stretches of wet red land, and gaping trenches; now e half-built houses, and half-built churches, with glassless windows and slateless roofs and jutting spars of wood, naked as bones.

    Now there are so many smuts upon the glass they show like faults in the fabriy veil. The train begins to rise. I dont like the sensation. We begin to cross streets—grey streets, black streets—so many monotonous streets, I think I shall never be able to tell them apart! Such a chaos of doors and windows, of roofs and eys, of horses and coaches and men and women! Such a muddle of hs and garish signs: Spanish blinds.—Lead Coffins.—Oil Tallo; Cotton Waste. Words, everywhere. Words, six-feet high. Words, shrieking and bellowing: Leather and Grindery.—Shop To Let.—Broughams &amp;  Carriages.—Paper-Stainers.—Supported Entirely.—To Let!— To Let!—By Voluntary Subscription.—

    There are words, all over the face of London. I see them, and cover my eyes. When I look again we have sunk: brick walls, thick with soot, have risen about the train and cast the coa gloom. Then es a great, vast, vaulting roof of tarnished glass, hung about with threads of smoke and steam and fluttering birds. We shudder to a frightful halt. There is the shrieking of ines, a thudding of doors, the pressing passage—it seems to me—of a thousand, thousand people.

    Paddington terminus, says Richard. e on.

    He moves and speaks more quickly here. He is ged. He does not look at me—I wish he would, now. He finds a man to take s. We stand in a line of people—a queue, I know the word—and wait for a carriage—a haey, I know that word also, from my uncles books. One may kiss in a haey; one may take any kind of liberty with ones lover; oells ones driver to go about the Regents Park. I know London. London is a city of opportunities fulfilled. This place, of jostling and clamour, I do not know. It is thick with purposes I do not uand. It is marked with words, but I ot read it. The regularity, the numberless repetition, of

    brick, of house, of street, of person—of dress, aure, and expression—stuns and exhausts me. I stand at Richards side and keep my arm in his. If he should leave me—! A whistle is blown and men, in dark suits—ordinary melemen—pass by us, running-

    We take our pla the haey at last, and are jerked out of the terminus into choked and filthy roads. Richard feels me tense. Are you startled, by the streets? he says. We must pass through worse, Im afraid. What did you expect? This is the city, where respectable men live side by side with squalor. Dont mind it. Dont mind it at all. We are going to your new home.

    To our house, I say. I think: There, with the doors and windows shut, I will grow calm. I will bathe, I will rest, I will sleep.

    To our house, he answers. Audies me a moment lohen reaches ae. Here, if the sight troubles you— He pulls down the blind.

    And so once agai, and sway to the motion of a coach, in a kind of twilight; but ressed about, this time, by all the roar of London. I do not see it when we go about the park. I do not see what route the driver takes, at all: perhaps I should not know it, if I did, though I have studied maps of the city, and know the plag of the Thames. I ot say, wheop, how long we have driven for—so preoccupied am I with the desperate stir of my senses a. Be bold, I am thinking. God damn you, Maud! You have longed for this. You have given up Sue, you have given up everything, for this. Be bold!

    Richard pays the man, theurns for s. From here we must walk, he says. I climb out, unassisted, and blink at the light— though the light here is dim enough: we have lost the sun, and the sky is anyway thick with cloud—brown cloud, like the dirty fleece of a sheep. I have expected to find myself at the door to his house, but there are no houses here: we have ereets that appear to me unspeakably shabby and mean—are hedged on one side by a great, dead wall, oher by the lime-stained arches of a bridge. Richard moves off. I catch at his arm.

    Is this right? I say.

    Quite right, he answers. e, dont be alarmed. We ot live grandly, yet. And we must make our entrahe quiet way, thats all.

    You are still afraid that my uncle may have seo watch

    usr

    He again moves off. e. We  talk soon, indoors. Not here. e on, this ick up your skirts.

    He walks quicker than ever now, and I am slow to follow. When he sees me hanging back he holds s in one hand and, with the other, takes my wrist. Not far, now, he says, kindly enough; his grip is tight, however. We leave that road and turn into another: here I  see the stained and broken face of what I take to be a single great house, but which is in fact the rear of a terrace of narrow dwellings. The air smells riverish, rank. People watch us, curiously. That makes me walk faster. Soourn again, into a lane of g ders. Here there are children, in a group: they are standing idly about a bird, which lurches and hops. They have tied its wings with twine. When they see us, they e and press close. They want money, or to tug at my sleeve, my cloak, my veil. Richard kicks them away. They swear for a miheurn to the bird. We take another, dirtier, path—Richard all the time gripping me harder, walking faster, faster, certain of his way. We are very close now, he says. Dont mind this filth, this is nothing. All London is filthy like this. Just a little further, I promise. And then you may rest.

    And at last, he slows. We have reached a court, with a thick mud floor ales. The walls are high, and running with damp. There is no open route from here, only two or three narrow covered passages, filled with darkness. Into one of these he makes to draw me, now; but, so blad foul is it, I suddenly hesitate, and pull against his grip.

    e on, he says, turning round, not smiling.

    e to where? I ask him.

    To your new life, that has waited for you to start it, too long. To our house. Our housekeeper expects us. e, now.—Or shall I leave you here?

    His voice is tired, hard. I look behind me. I see the other pas-

    sages, but the muddy path he has led me down is hidden—as if the glistening walls have parted to let us e, then closed to trap me.

    What  I do? I ot go back, aloo the children, the labyrinth of lahe street, the city. I ot go back to Sue. I am not meant to. Everything has been impelling me here, to this dark point. I must go forward, or cease to exist. I think again of the room that is waiting for me: of the door, with its key that will turn; of the bed, on which I shall lie and sleep, and sleep—

    I hesitate, one seore; the him draw me into the passage. It is short, and ends with a flight of shallow stairs, leading downwards; and these, in turn, end at a door, on which he knocks. From beyond the door there es at ohe barking of a dog, then soft, quick footsteps, a grinding bolt. The dog falls silent. The door is opened, by a fair-haired boy—I suppose, the housekeepers boy. He looks at Richard and nods.

    All right? he says.

    All right, answers Richard. Is Aunty home? Heres a lady, look, e to stay.

    The boy surveys me, I see him squinting to make out the features behind my veil. Then he smiles, nods again, draws back the door to let us pass him; closes it tightly at our backs.

    The room beyond is a kind of kit—I suppose, a servants kit, for it is small, and windowless, dark and unwholesome, and chokingly hot: there is a good fire lit, and one or two smoking lamps upon a table and—perhaps, after all, these are the grooms quarters—a brazier in a cage, with tools about it. Beside the brazier is a pale man in an apron who, on seeing us e, sets down some fork or file and wipes his hands and looks me over, frankly. Before the fire sit a young woman and a boy: the girl fat-faced, red-haired, also watg me freely; the boy sallow and scowling, chewing with brokeh on a strip of dry meat, and dressed—I notice this, even in my fusion—in araordinary coat, that seems pieced together from many varieties of fur. He holds, between his knees, a squirming dog, his hand about its jaws to keep it from barking. He looks at Richard and then at me. He surveys my coat and gloves and bo. He whistles.

    rice them togs, he says.

    Then he flinches as, from another chair—a rog chair, that creaks as it tilts—a white-haired woman leans to strike him. I suppose her the housekeeper. She has watched me, more closely and more eagerly than any of the others. She holds a bundle: now she puts it down and struggles from her seat, and the bundle gives a shudder. This is more astonishing than the lighted brazier, the coat of fur—it is a sleeping, swollen-headed baby in a bla.

    I look at Richard. I think he will speak, or lead me on. But he has taken his hand from me and stands with folded arms, very leisurely. He is smiling, but smiling oddly. Everyone is silent. No-one moves save the white-haired woman. She has left her chair and es about the table. She is dressed in taffeta, that rustles. Her face has a blush, and shines. She es to me, she stands before me, her head weaves as she tries to catch the line of my features. She moves her mouth, wets her lips. Her gaze is still close and terribly eager. When she raises her blunt red hands to me, I flinch.—Richard, I say. But he still does nothing, and the womans look, that is so awful and se, pels me. I stand a her fumble for my veil. She puts it back. And then her gaze ges, grows straill, when she sees my face. She touches my cheek, as if uain it will remaih her fingers.

    She keeps her eyes on mine, but speaks to Richard. Her voice is thick with the tears of age, or of emotion.

    Good boy, she says.

 Chapter Twelve

    Then there es a kind of chaos.

    The dog barks and leaps, the baby in its bla gives a cry; another baby, that I have not noticed—it lies in a tin box, beh the table—begins to cry also. Richard takes off his hat and his coat, sets down s, and stretches. The scowling boy drops open his mouth and shows the meat within.

    It aint Sue, he says.

    Miss Lilly, says the woman before me, quietly. Aint you just the darling. Are you very tired, dear? You have e quite a journey

    It aint Sue, says the boy again, a little louder.

    ge of plan, says Richard, not catg my eye. Sue stays °n behind, to take care of a feoints.—Mr Ibbs, how are you, sir?

    Sweet, son, the pale man answers. He has taken off his apron and is quieting the dog. The boy who opehe door to us has

    gohe little brazier is cooling and tig and growing grey. The red-haired girl bends over the screaming babies with a bottle and a spoon, but is still stealing looks at me.

    The scowling boy says, ge of plan? I do. You will, answers Richard. Unless— He puts his finger against his mouth, and winks.

    The woman, meanwhile, is still before me, still describing my face with her hands, telling off my features as if they were beads upon a string. Brown eyes, she says, beh her breath; her breath is sweet as sugar. Pink lips, two pouters. Nid dainty at the . Teeth, white as a. Cheeks—rather soft, I dare say? Oh!

    I have stood, as if in a trance, a her murmur; now, feeling her fingers flutter against my face, I start away from her.

    How dare you? I say. How dare you speak to me? How dare you look at me, any of you? And you— I go to Richard and seize his waistcoat. What is this? Where have yht me to? What do they know of Sue, here?

    Hey, hey, calls the pale man mildly. The boy laughs. The woman looks rueful.

    Got a voice, dont she? says the girl.

    Like the blade on a knife, says the man. That .

    Richard meets my gaze, then looks away. What  I say? He shrugs. I am a villain.

    Damn your attitudes now! I say. Tell me what this means. Whose house is this? Is it yours?

    Is it his! The boy laughs harder, and chokes on his meat.

    John, be quiet, or Ill thrash you, says the woman. Dont mind him, Miss Lilly, I implore you now, dont!

    I  feel her wringing her hands, but do not look at her. I keep my eyes upon Richard. Tell me, I say.

    Not mine, he answers at last.

    Not ours? He shakes his head. Whose, then? Where, then?

    He rubs at his eye. He is tired. It is theirs, he says, nodding to the woman, the man. Their house, in the Bh.

    The Bh ... I have heard him say the name, once or twice before. I stand for a moment in silehinking back across his

    words; then my heart drops. Sues house, I say. Sues house, of thieves.

    Hohieves, says the woman, creeping closer, to those that know us!

    I think: Sues aunt! I was sorry for her, onow I turn and almost spit at her. Will you keep from me, you witch? The kit grows silent. It seems darker, too, and close. I still have Richard gripped by the waistcoat. Wheries to pull away, I hold him tighter. My thoughts are leaping, fast as hares. I think, He has married me, and has brought me here, as a place to be rid of me. He means to keep my money for himself. He means to give them some trifling share for the killing of me, and Sue—even in the midst of my shod fusion, my heart drops again, as I think it—Sue they will free. Sue knows it all.

    You shant do it! I say, my voice rising. You think I dont know what you mean to do? All of you? What trick?

    You dont know anything, Maud, he answers. He tries to draw my hands from his coat. I will not let him. I think, if he does that, they will certainly kill me. For a sed we struggle. Then: The stitg, Maud! he says. He plucks my fingers free. I catch at his arm instead.

    Take me back, I say. I say it, thinking: Dohem see you are afraid! But my voice has risen higher and I ake it firm. Take me back, at oo the streets and haeys.

    He shakes his head, looks away. I t do it.

    Take me now. o, alone. I shall make my way—I saw the route! I studied it, hard!—and I shall find out a—a poli!

    The boy, the pale man, the woman and girl, all flinch or wihe dog barks.

    Now now, says the man, stroking his moustache. You must be careful how you talk, dear, in a house like this.

    It is you who must be careful! I say. I look from one face to another. What is it y<u></u>ou think you shall have from this? Money? Oh, no. It is you who must be careful. It is all of you! And you, Richard—you—who must be most careful of all, should I once find a poli and begin to talk.

    But Richard looks and says nothing. Do you hear me? I cry.

    The man winces again, and puts his fio his ear as if to clear it of wax. Like a blade, he says, to no-oo everyone. Aint it?

    Damn you! I say. I look wildly about me for a moment, then make a sudden grab at my bag. Richard reaches it first, however, he hooks it with his long leg and kicks it across the floor, almost playfully. The boy takes it up, and holds it in his lap. He produces a knife and begins to pick at the lock. The blade flashes.

    Richard folds his arms. You see you ot leave, Maud, he says simply. You ot go, with nothing.

    He has moved to the door, to stand before it. There are other doors, that lead, perhaps to a street, perhaps only into other dark rooms. I shall never choose the right one. I am sorry, he says.

    The boys knife flashes again. Now, I think, they will kill me. The thought itself is like a blade, and astonishingly sharp. For havent I willed my life away, at Briar? Havent I felt it rising from me, and been glad? Now I suppose they mean to kill me; and I am more afraid than I have imagi possible to be, of anything, anything at all.

    You fool, I say to myself. But to them I say: You shant. You shant! I run one way, and then another; finally I dart, not for the door at Richards back, but for the slumbering, swollen-headed baby. I seize it, and shake it, and put my hand to its neck. You shant! I say again. Damn you, do you think I have e so far, for this? I look at the woman. I shall kill your baby first!—I think I would do it.—See, here! I shall stifle it!

    The man, the girl, the boy, look ied. The woman looks sorry. My dear, she says, I have seven babies about the place, just now. Make it six, if you want. Make it—with a gesture to the tin box beh the table—make it five. It is all the same to me. I fancy I am about to give the business up, anyway.

    The creature in my arms slumbers on, but gives a kick. I feel the rapid palpitation of its heart beh my fingers, and there is a

    fluttering at the top of its swollen head. The woman still watches. The girl Puts ^er hand to her neck, and rubs. Richard searches in his pocket for a cigarette. He says, as he does it, Put the damn child down, Maud, wont you?

    He says it mildly; and I bee aware of myself, my hands at a babys throat. I set the child carefully down upoable, among the plates and a cups. At ohe boy takes his knife from the loy bag and waves it over its head.

    Ha-ha! he cries. The lady wouldnt do it. John Vroom shall have him—lips, nose and ears!

    The girl squeals, as if tickled. The woman says sharply, Thats enough. Or are all my infants to be worried out of their cradles, into their graves? Fine farm I should be left with then. Dainty, see to little Sidney before he scalds himself, do. Miss Lilly will suppose herself e among savages. Miss Lilly, I  see youre a spirited girl. I expected nothing less. But you dont imagine we mean to hurt you? She es to me again. She ot stand without toug me—now she puts her hand upon me and strokes my sleeve. You dont imagine you aint more wele here, than anyone?

    I still shake, a little. I t imagine, I say, pulling myself away from her hands, that you mean me any kind of good, since you persist in keeping me here, when I so clearly wish to leave.

    She tilts her head. Hear the grammar in that, Mr Ibbs? she says. The man says he does. She strokes me again. Sit down, my darling. Look at this chair: got from a very grand place, it might be waiting for you. Wont you take off your cloak, and your bo? You shall swelter, we keep a very warm kit. Wont you slip off yloves?—Well, you know best.

    I have drawn in my hands. Richard<s></s> catches the womans eye. Miss Lilly, he says quietly, is rather particular about the fingers. Was made to wear gloves, from an early age—he lets his voice drop still further, and mouths the last few words in an exaggerated way— by her uncle.

    The woman looks sage.

    Your uncle, she says. Now, I know all about him. Made you look at a lot of filthy French books. And did he touch you, dear,

    where he oughtnt to have? Never mind it now. Never mind it, here. Better your own uhan a stranger, I always say.—Oh, now aint that a shame?

    I have sat, to disguise the trembling of my legs; but have pushed her from me. My chair is close to the fire and she is right, it is hot, it is terribly hot, my cheek is burning; but I must not move, I must think. The boy still picks at the lock. French books, he says, with a she red-haired girl has the fingers of the babys hands in her mouth and is sug on them, idly. The man has e he woman is still at my side. The light of the fire picks out her , her cheek, an eye, a lip. The lip is smooth. She wets it.

    I turn my head, but not my gaze. Richard, I say. He doesnt answer. Richard! The woman reaches to me and unfastens the string of my bo and draws it from my head. She pats my hair, then takes up a lock of it and rubs it between her fingers.

    Quite fair, she says, in a sort of wonder. Quite fair, like gold almost.

    Do you mean to sell it? I say then. Here, take it! I snatch at the lock she has caught up and rip it from its pins. You see, I say, when she winces, you ot hurt me as much as I  hurt myself. Now, let me go.

    She shakes her head. Yrowing wild, my dear, and spoiling your pretty hair. Havent I said? We doo harm you. Here is John Vroom, look; and Delia Warren, that we call Dainty: you shall think them cousins, I hope, in time. And Mr Humphry Ibbs: he has been waiting for you—havent you, Mr Ibbs? And here am I. Ive been waiting for you, hardest of all. Dear me, how hard it has been.

    She sighs. The boy looks up at her and scowls. Jigger me, he says, if I know which way the wind is blowing now. He nods to me. Aint she meant to be—he hugs his arms about himself, shows his tongue, lets his eyes roll—on a violent ward?

    The woman lifts her arm, and he winks and draws back. You watch your face, she says savagely. And then, gazily at me: Miss Lilly is throwing in her fortunes with ours. Miss Lilly

    dont know her own mind just yet—as who would, in her place? Miss Lilly, I daresay you aint had a morsel of food in hours. What we got, that will tempt you? She rubs her hands together. Should you care for a mutton chop? A piece of Dutch cheese? A supper of fish? We got a stall on the er, sells any kind of fish—you name me the breed, Dainty shall slip out, bring it back, fry it up, quick as winking. What shall it be? We got a plates, look, fit for royalty. We got silver forks— Mr Ibbs, pass me one of them forks. See here, dear. A little rough about the handle, aint it? Dont mind it, darling. Thats where we takes the crest off. Feel the weight of it, though. Aint them prongs very shapely? Theres a Member of Parliament had his mouth about those. Shall it be fish, dear? Or the

    chop?

    She stands, bending to me, with the fork close to my face. I push

    it aside.

    Do you suppose, I say, I mean to sit a a supper with you? With any of you? Why, I should be ashamed to call you servants! Throw in my fortunes with yours? <cite>?99liｂ?</cite>I should rather be beggared. I should rather die!

    There is a sed of silehen: Got a dander, says the boy. Dont she?

    But the woman shakes her head, looks almost admiring. Daintys got a dander, she answers. Why, Ive got one myself. Any ordinary girl  have one of them. What a lady has, they call something else. What do they call it, Gentleman? She says this to Richard, who is leaning tiredly to tug upon the ears of the slavering dog.

    Hauteur, he answers, not looking up.

    Hauteur, she repeats.

    Mersee, says the boy, giving me a leer. I should hate, after all, to have mistook it for on bad manners, and punched her.

    He returns to the clasp of my bag. The man watches, and winces. Aint you learned yet, he says, the handling of a lock? Dont prise it, boy, and mash the levers. Thats sweet little work. You are just about to bust it.

    The boy makes a final stab with his knife, his face darkening, ruck! he says.—The first time I have ever heard the word used as

    a curse. He takes the point of the blade from the lod puts it to the leather beh, and before I  cry out and stop him he slices it, swiftly, in one long gash.

    Well, thats like you, says the man platly.

    He has taken out a pipe, and lights it. The boy puts his hands to the slit in the leather. I watch him do it and, though my cheek is still burning from the heat of the fire, I grow cold. The cutting of the bag has shocked me, more than I  say. I begin to tremble.

    Please, I say. Please give me back my things. I shall not trouble about the poli, if you will only give back what is mine, a me go.

    I suppose my voice has some new, piteous o it; for now they all turn their heads and study me, and the woman es close again and again strokes my hair.

    Nhtened, still? she says amazedly. Nhtened, of John Vroom? Why, he is just being playful.—John, how dare you? Put your knife aass me Miss Lillys bag.—There. Are you sorry for it, dear? Why, its a creased old thing, that looks like it aint been used in fifty years. We shall get you a proper one. Shahough!

    The boy makes a show of grumbling but gives up the bag; and when the woman hands it to me I take it and hug it. There are tears, rising in my throat.

    Boo-hoo, says the boy in disgust, when he sees me swallow. He leans and leers at me again. I liked you better, he says, when you was a chair.

    I am sure he says that. The words bewilder me, and I shrink away. I twist to look at Richard. Please, Richard, I say. Fods sake, isnt it enough to have tricked me? How  you stand so coolly while they torment me?

    He holds my gaze, stroking his beard. Then he says to the woman: Havent you a quieter place, for her to sit in?

    A quieter place? she answers. Why, I have a room made ready. I only supposed Miss Lilly should like to warm her face first down here. Should you like to e up, dear, now? Make your hair ? Wash your hands?

    I should like to be shown to the street, and a haey, I answer. Only that, only that.

    Well, we shall put you at the window; and you shall see the street from there. e up, my darling. Let me take that old bag.— Want to keep it? All right. Aint yrip a strong one! Gentleman, you e along, too, why dont you? Youll take your old room, at the top?

    I will, he answers, if youll have me. For the wait.

    They exge a glance. She has put her hands upon me and, in drawing from her grasp, I have risen. Richard es and stands close. I shrink from him, too, aween them—as a pair of dogs might menace a sheep into a pen—they guide me from the kit, through one of the doors, towards a staircase. Here it is darker and cooler, and I feel the draught perhaps of a street-door, and slow my steps; but I think, too, of what the woman has said, about the window: I imagine I might call from it, or drop from it—or fling myself from it—should they try to hurt me. The staircase is narrow, and bare of carpet; here and there, oeps, are chipped a cups half-filled with water, holding floating wicks, casting shadows.

    Lift your skirts, dear, above the flames, says the woman, going up before me. Richard es, very close, behind.

    At the top there are doors, all shut: the ens the first, and shows me through it to a small square room. A bed, a wash-hand stand, a box, a chest of drawers, a horse-hair s—and a window, to which I instantly cross. It is narrow, and has a bleached  scarf hung before it. The hasp has been broken long ago: the sashes are fixed together with nails. The view is of a slip of muddy street, a house with oi-coloured shutters with heart-shaped holes, a wall of brick, with loops and spirals marked upon it in yellow chalks.

    I stand and study it all, my bag still clutched to me, but my arms growing heavy. I hear Richard pause, then climb a sed set of stairs; then he walks about the room above my head. The woman crosses to the wash-hand stand and pours a little water from the jug mto the bowl. Now I see my mistake, in ing so quickly to the window: for she stands between me and the door. She is stout, and

    her arms are thick. I think I might push her aside, however, if I was to surprise her.

    Perhaps she is thinking the same thing. Her hands are h about the wash-hand stand, her head is tilted, but she is watg me, in the same close, eager, half-awed, half-admiring way as before.

    Heres sted soap, she says. And heres a b. Heres a hairbrush. I say nothing. Heres a towel for your face. Heres eau-de-Cologne. She draws the stopper from the bottle and the liquid slops. She es to me, her wrist bared and made wet with a siing perfume. Dont you care, she says, for lavender?

    I have stepped away from her, and look at the door. From the kit, the boys voies very clearly: You tart! I dont care, I say, taking aep, to be tricked. She steps, too. What trickery, darling?

    Do you think I meant to e here? Do you think I mean to stay?

    I think you are only startled. I think you aint quite yourself. Not quite myself? Whats myself to you? Who are you, to say how I might ht not be?

    At that, her gaze falls. She draws her sleeve over her wrist, returns to the wash-hand stand, touches again the soap, the b, the brush and towel. Downstairs, a chair is drawn across the floor, something is thrown or falls, the dog barks. Upstairs, Richard walks, coughs, mutters. If I am to run, I must do it now. Which way shall I go? Down, down, the way I have e. Which was the door, at the bottom, that they led me through?—the sed, or the first? I am not sure. Never mind, I think. Go now! But I do not. The woman lifts her face, catches my eye, I hesitate; and in the moment of that hesitation Richard crosses his floor and steps heavily dowairs. He es into the room. He has a cigarette behind his ear. He has rolled his sleeves up to his elbows, and his beard is dark with water.

    He closes the door, and locks it. Take your cloak off, Maud, he says. I think: He is going tle me.

    T keep my cloak quite fastened, and move backwards, slowly, from him and from the woman, back to the window. I will

    ash it with my elbow if I must. I will shriek into the street. Richard watches me and sighs. He makes his eyes wide. You need

    t he says, look so like a rabbit. Do you think I would bring you all this way, to hurt you?

    And do you think, I answer, I will trust you not to? You told me vourself, at Briar, what lengths you will go to, for moneys sake. I wish I had listened harder, then! Tell me now you doo cheat me of all my fortuell me you sha, through Sue. I suppose you will fetch her, after some slight delay. She will be cured, I suppose. My heart tracts. Clever Sue. Good girl.

    Shut up, Maud.

    Why? So you may kill me in silence? Go on and do it. Then live with the deed upon your sce. I suppose you have one?

    Not one, he says, quickly and lightly, that would be troubled by the murder of you, I assure you. He presses his fio his eyes. Mrs Sucksby, however, would not like it.

    Her, I say, with a gla the woman. She is still gazing at the soap, the brush, not speaking. You do everything, at her word?

    Everything in this case. He says it meaningfully; and when I hesitate, not uanding, he goes on: Listen to me, Maud. The scheme was hers, all of it. From start to finish, hers. And, villain that I am, I am not so great a swihat I would swindle her of that.

    His face seems ho—but then, it has seemed hoo me before. You are lying, I say.

    No. This is the truth.

    Her scheme. I ot believe it. She that sent you to Briar, to my uncle? And before that, to Paris? To Mr Hawtrey?

    She that seo you. No matter all the twisting paths I took to reach you. I might have taken them anyway, and not known what lay at the end of them. I might have passed you by! Perhaps many men have. They have not had Mrs Sucksby, guiding their steps.

    I glaween them. She knew of my fortuhen, I say after a moment. So anyone might, I suppose. She knew—who? My uncle? Some servant of the house?

    She knew you, Maud, you; before almost anyone.

    The woman lifts her eyes to mine again at last, and nods. I knew your mother, she says.

    My mother! My hand goes to my throat—a curious thing, for my mothers portrait lies with my jewels, its ribbon fraying, I have not worn it in years. My mother! I came to London to escape her. Now, all at once, I think of her grave in the park at Briar—untended, untrimmed, its white stone creeping with grey.

    The woman still watches. I let my hand drop.

    I dont believe you, I say. My mother? What was her name?__

    tell me that.

    She begins to look sly. I know it, she says, but wont say it just yet. Ill tell you the letter that started it, though. That was a M, like what starts your name. Ill tell you the sed letter. That was a I A.—Why, thats like your oo! The  letter, though, is where they runs off different. That was aR . . .

    She knows it, I know she knows it. How  she? I study her face—her eye, her lip. They seem familiar to me. What is it? Who is she?

    A nurse, I say. You were a nurse—

    But she shakes her head, almost smiles. Now, why should I have been that?

    You dont know everything, then! I say. You dont know that I was born in a madhouse!

    Was you? she answers quickly. Why do you say so?

    You think I dont remember my own home?

    I should say you remember the place you lived in when you was little. Why, so do we all. Dont mean we was born there.

    I was, I know it, I say.

    You was told it, I expect.

    Every one of my uncles servants knows it!

    They was told it, too, perhaps. Does that make it true? Maybe, j Maybe not.

    As she speaks, she moves from the wash-hand stand to the bed, and sits upon it, slowly and heavily. She looks at Richard. She puts her hand to her ear, and strokes the lobe. With a show of lightness

    she says, Find your room all right, Gentleman?—I have guessed at last that this is some name he goes by here, among the thieves. Find your room all right? He nods. She gazes at me again. We keeps that room, she goes on, in the same light, friendly, dangerous tone, fentleman to kip in when he es. A very high, out-of-the-way sort of room it is, I  tell you. Seen all manner of business up there; all sorts of tricks. People been known to e here, rather quiet—she pretends surprise—why, just as you have e!—to spend a day, two days, two weeks, who knows how long? tucked a there. Chaps, maybe, that the police would like a word with. t be found—do you see?—when they e here. Chaps, girls, kids, ladies

    After this last word she pauses. She pats the space at her side. Wont you sit, dear girl? Dont care to? Hmm? Perhaps in a mihen. The bed has a bla upon it—a quilt of coloured squares, roughly knitted, and roughly sewn together. She begins to pluck at one of its seams, as if in distra. Now, what was I speaking of? she says, her eyes on mine.

    Of ladies, says Richard.

    She moves her hand, lifts her finger. Of ladies, she says. Thats right. Of course, there e so few true ladies, you find they rather sticks in the mind. I remember one, particular, that came—oh, how long ago? Sixteen years? Seventeeeen . . .? She watches my face. Seems a long time to you, sweetheart, I dare say. Seems a lifetime, dont it? Only wait, dear girl, till you are my age. The years all run together, then. All run together, like so many tears . . . She gives a jerk of her head, draws in her breath in a backwards sigh, quid rueful. She waits. But I have grown still, and cold, and cautious, and say nothing. So then she goes on.

    Well, this particular lady, she says, she wasnt much older than you are now. But wasnt she in a fix? She had got my name from a woman in the Bh, that did girls and their plaints. You know what I am saying, dear? Made girls be poorly, in the regular way, when their poorliness had stopped? She moves her hand, makes a face. I never bothered with that. That was out of my line. My idea was, if it wasnt going to kill you on its way out, t?hen have

    it, and sell it; or whats better, give it to me a me sell it for you!—I mean, to people that want infants, for servants or apprentices, or fular sons and daughters. Did you know, dear girl, that there were people in the world, like that?—and people like me, providing the infants? No? Again, I make no answer. Again she moves her hand. Well, perhaps this lady I am speaking of now didnt know it either, till she came to me. Poor thing. The Bh woman had tried to help her, but she was too far on, she had only got sick. &quot;Wheres your husband?&quot; I said, before I took her in. &quot;Wheres your ma? Wheres all your people? Wont follow you here, will they?&quot; She said they wouldnt. She had no husband—that was her trouble, of course. Her mother was dead. She had run away from a great, grand house, forty miles from London—up-river, she said ...&quot; She nods, still keeping her eyes on mine. I have grown colder than ever. Her father and her brother were looking for her, and seemed likely to just about kill her; but would never find their way to the Bh, she swore it. As for the gentleman that had started her troubles all off, by saying he loved her—well, he had a wife and a kiddie of his own, and had given her up as ruined, and washed his hands.—As gentlemen, of course, will do.

    Which, in a line like mine, you say thank heavens for! She smiles, almost winks. This lady had money. I took her, and put her upstairs. Perhaps I oughtnt to have do. Mr Ibbs did say I oughtnt to. For I had five or six babies in the house already, and was worn out and fretful—more fretful, through having just borne a little infant of my own, that had died— Here her look ges, and she waves a hand before her eyes. I wont talk of that, however. I wont talk of that.

    She swallows and looks about her for a moment, as if in search of the fallen threads of her story. Then she seems to find them. The fusion passes from her face, she catches my eye again, theures upwards. I glance, with her, at the ceiling. It is a dirty yellow, marked grey with the smoke of lamps.

    Up there we put her, she says, ilemans room. And all day long I would sit beside her and hold her hand, and every night I would hear her turning in her bed, and g. Nearly broke your

    heart. She had no more harm ihan milk does. I supposed she might die. Mr Ibbs supposed it. I think even she supposed it, for she was meant to go awo months, and anyone could see that she wouldnt have the strength to go half that time. But maybe the baby k, too—they do know, sometimes. For we only have her here a week, before her water busts and it starts ing. Takes a day and a night. Means to e, all right! Even so, its a shrimp of a thing, but the lady—being so poorly already—is quite made rags of. Then she hears her baby cry, and picks up her head from her pillow. &quot;Whats that, Mrs Sucksby?&quot; she says. &quot;Thats your baby, my dear!&quot; I tell her. &quot;My baby?&quot; says she. &quot;Is my baby a boy, irl?&quot; &quot;Its a girl,&quot; I say. And when she hears that she cries out with all her lungs: &quot;Then God help her! For the world is cruel to girls. I wish she had died, ah her!&quot;

    She shakes her head, lifts her hands, lets them fall upon her knees. Richard leans against the door. The door has a hook, with a silk dressing-gown hanging from it: he has taken up the belt of the gown and is idly passing it across his mouth. His eyes are on miheir lids a little lowered; his look is unreadable. From the kit below us there es laughter and a ragged shrieking. The woman listens, gives another of those backwards, rueful sighs.

    Theres Dainty, g again . . . She rolls her eyes. But how I have run on!—havent I, Miss Lilly? Not findiiresome, dear? Aint much to hold the i, perhaps, in these old tales ...&quot;

    Go on, I say. My mouth is dry, and sticks. Go on, about the woman.

    The lady, what had the little girl? Such a slight little scrap of a girl, she was: fair-haired, blue-eyed—well, they all e out blue, of course; and brown up, later . . .

    She looks, meaningfully, into my own brown eyes. I blink, and colour. But my voice I make flat. Go on, I say again. I know you mean to tell me. Tell me now. The woman wished her daughter dead. What then?

    Wished her dead? She moves her head. So she said. So women do say, sometimes. And sometimes they mean it. Not her, though. That child was everything to her, and when I said she had much

    better give her up to me, than keep her, she grew quite wild. &quot;What, you doo raise her yourself?&quot; I said. &quot;You, a lady, without a husband?&quot; She said she would pass herself off as a widow—meant to go abroad, where no-one knew her, and make her living as a seamstress. &quot;Ill see my daughter married to a poor man before she knows my shame,&quot; she said. &quot;Im through with the quality life.&quot; That was her ohought, poor thing, that no amount of sensible talking from me could shake her of: that she would sooner see her girl live low but ho, than give her back to the world of money she e from. She meant to start for France so soon as her strength was all bad Ill tell you this now, I thought she was a fool; but I would have cut my own arm to help her, she was that simple and good.

    She sighs. But its the simple and the good that are meant to suffer in this world—aint it, though! She kept very weak, and her baby hardly grew. Still she talked, all the time, of Fra was all she thought of; until one night, I utting her into her bed when there es a knog on our kit door. Its the woman, from the Bh, what first put her on to me: I see her face, and know theres trouble. There is. What do you think? The ladys pa and brother have tracked her down after all. &quot;Theyre ing,&quot; says the woman. &quot;Lord help me, I never meant to tell them where you was; but the brother had a e, and whipped me.&quot; She shows me her back, and its black. &quot;Theyve gone for a coach,&quot; she says, &quot;and a bully to help them. I should say youve an het your lady out now, if she means to go. Try to hide her and theyll pull your house apart!&quot;

    Well! The poor lady had followed me down and heard it all, and started shrieking. &quot;Oh, Im done for!&quot; she said. &quot;Oh, if I might only have got to France!&quot;—but the trip downstairs had half-killed her, she was so weak. &quot;Theyll take my baby!&quot; she said. &quot;Theyll take her and make her theirs! Theyll put her in their great house, they might as well lock her into a tomb! Theyll take her, and turn her heart against me—oh! and I havent even named her! I havent even named her!&quot; Thats all she would say. &quot;I havent even named her!&quot;—&quot;Name her now, then!&quot; I said, just to make her be quiet. &quot;Name her quick, while you still got the ce.&quot; &quot;I will!&quot; she said.

    &quot;But, what name shall I give her?&quot; &quot;Well,&quot; I said, &quot;think on: shes to be a lady after all, theres no helping it now. Give her a hatll fit her. Whats your own name? Give her that.&quot; Then she looked dark. She said, &quot;My names a hateful one, Id sooner curse her before I let anyone call her Marianne—&quot;

    She stops, seeing my face. It has jumped, or twisted—though I have known that the story must reach this point, and have stood, feeling my breath e shorter, my stomach grow sourer, as the tale proceeds. I draw in my breath. Its not true, I say. My mother, ing here, without a husband? My mother was mad. My father was a soldier. I have his ring. Look here, look here!

    I have goo my bag, and I stoop to it, and pull at the torher and find the little square of lihat holds my jewels. There is the ring that they gave me in the madhouse: I hold it up. My hand is shaking. Mrs Sucksby studies it and shrugs.

    Rings may be got, she says, from just about anywhere.

    From him, I say.

    From anywhere. I could get you ten like that, have them stamped V.R.—Would that make them the Queens?

    I ot answer. For what do I know about where rings e from and how they may be stamped? I say again, more weakly, My mother ing here, without a husband. Ill, and ing here. My father— My uncle— I look up. My uncle. Why should my uncle lie?

    Why should he tell the truth? says Richard, ing forward, speaking at last. I dare swear his sister was ho enough, before her ruin, and only unlucky; but thats the sort of unluess— well, that a ma care to talk about too freely . . .

    I gaze again at the ring. There is a cut upon it I liked, as a girl, to suppose made by a bayo. Now the gold feels light, as if pierced and made hollow.

    My mother, I say, doggedly, was mad. She bore me, strapped to a table.—No. I put my hands to my eyes. That part, perhaps, was my own fancy. But not the rest. My mother was mad—was kept in the cell of a madhouse; and I was made to be mindful of her example, lest I should follow it.

    She was certainly, ohey had got her, put in a cell, says Richard; as we know girls are, from time to time, for the satisfa of gentlemen.—Well, no more of that, just yet. He has caught Mrs Sucksbys eye. And you were certainly kept in fear of following her, Maud. And what did that do to you?—save make you anxious, obedient, careless of your own forts—in other words, exactly fit you to your uncles fancy? Didnt I tell you once, what a sdrel he was?

    You are wrong, I say. You are wrong, or mistaken.

    No mistake, answers Mrs Sucksby.

    You may be lying, even now. Both of you!

    We may be. She taps her mouth. But you see, dear girl, we aint.

    My uncle, I say again. My uncles servants. Mr Way, Mrs Stiles . . .

    But I say it, and I feel—the ghost of a pressure—Mr Ways shoulder against my ribs, his finger in the crook of my knee: Fancy yourself a lady, do you?—And then, and then, Mrs Stiless hard hands on my pimpling arms and her breath against my cheek:

    Why your mother, with all her fortune, should have turned out trash—/

    I know it, I know it. I still hold the ring. Now, with a cry, I throw it to the floor—as I once, as a furious child, threw cups and saucers.

    Damn him! I say. I think of myself at the foot of my uncles bed, the razor in my hand, his unguarded eye. fidence Abused. Damn him! Richard nods. I turn upon him, then. And damn you, with him! You khis, all along? Why not tell me, at Briar? Dont you think it would have made me the likelier to go with you? Why wait, and bring me here—to this foul place!—to trid surprise me?

    Surprise you? he says, with a curious laugh. Oh, Maud, sweet Maud, we havent begun to do that.

    I dont uand him. I hardly try to. I am thinking still of my uncle, my mother—my mother, ill, ruined, ing here . . . Richard puts his hand to his , works his lips. Mrs Sucksby, he says, do you keep any drink up here? I find myself rather dry about the

    mouth. Its the anticipation, I think, of sensation. I am the same at the o, at the spinning of the wheel; and at the pantomime, when theyre about to let fly the fairies.

    Mrs Sucksby hesitates, theo a shelf, opens a box, lifts out a bottle. She produces three short tumblers with gold about the rim- She wipes them, on a fold of her skirt.

    I hope, Miss Lilly, you wont suppose this sherry, she says, as she pours. The st of the liquid es sharp and sickly upon the close air of the room. Sherry in a ladys chamber I could never agree to; but a bit of ho brandy, meant for use now and then as a bracer—well, you tell me, wheres the harm in that?

    No harm at all, says Richard. He holds a glass to me and, so fused am I—so dazed and enraged—I take it at once, and sip it as if it were wine. Mrs Sucksby watches me swallow.

    Got a good mouth for spirits, she says approvingly.

    Got a mouth for them, says Richard, when theyre marked up, Medie. Hey, Maud?

    I will not ahe brandy is hot. I sit, at last, upon the edge of the bed and unfasten the cord of my cloak. The room is darker than before: the day is turning into night. The horse-hair s looms black, and casts shadows. The walls—that are papered here in a pattern of flowers, there in muddy diamonds—are gloomy and close. The scarf stands out against the window: a fly is caught behind it, and buzzes in hopeless fury against the glass.

    I sit with my head in my hands. My brain, like the room, seems hedged about with darkness; my thoughts run, but run uselessly. I do not ask—as I would, I think, if this were some irls story and I was only reading it or hearing it told—I do not ask why they have got me here; what they mean to do with me now; how they plan to profit from the cheating and stunning of me. I only rage, still, against my uncle. I only think, over and over: My mother, ruined, shamed, ing here, lying bleeding in a house of thieves. Not mad, not mad . . .

    I suppose my expression is a strange one. Richard says, Maud, look at me. Dont think, now, of your uncle and your uncles house. Dont think of that woman, Marianne.

    I shall think of her, I answer, I shall think of her as I always have: as a fool! But, my father— You said, a gentleman? They have made me out an orphan, all these years. Does my father still live? Did he never—?

    Maud, Maud, he says, sighing, moving back to his place at the door. Look about you. Think how you came here. Do you suppose I snatched you from Briar, did the deed I did this m—ran the risks I have run—so that you might learn family secrets, no more than that?

    I dont know! I say. What do I know, now? If you will only give me a little time, to think in. If you will only tell me—

    But Mrs Sucksby has e to me, and lightly touches my arm.

    Wait up, dear girl, she says, very gently. She puts a fio her lip, half closes one eye. Wait up, and listen. You aint heard all my story. The better parts to e. For theres the lady, you remember, thats been made rags of. Theres the father and the brother and the bully, due in one hours time. Theres the baby, and me saying, &quot;Whatll we name her? What about your own name, Marianne?&quot;, and the lady saying as how shed sooner curse her, than call her that. You remember, my dear? &quot;As for being the daughter of a lady,&quot; says the pirl , &quot;you tell me this: what does being a lady do for you, except let you be ruined? I want her named plain,&quot; she says, &quot;like a girl of the people. I want her named plain.&quot; &quot;You name her plain, then,&quot; I say—still meaning, as it were, to humour her. &quot;I will,&quot; she says. &quot;I will. There was a servant that was kind to me once—kihan ever my father or my brother was. I want her named for her. I shall call her for her. I shall call her—&quot;

    Maud, I say, wretchedly. I have lowered my face again. But when Mrs Sucksby is silent, I lift it. Her look is strange. Her silence is strange. She slowly shakes her head. She draws in her breath— hesitates, for another sed—and then says:

    Susan.

    Richard watches, his hand before his mouth. The room, the house, is still. My thoughts, that have seemed to turn like grinding wheels, now seem to stop. Susan. Susan. I will not let them see how the word founds me. Susan. I will not speak. I will not move, for

    fear I should stumble or shake. I only keep my eyes upon Mrs Sucksbys face. She takes another, longer sip from her glass of brandy, then wipes her mouth. She es and sits again, beside me, upon the bed.

    Susan, she says again. Thats what the lady named her. Seems a shame to have hat baby for a servant, dont it? So I thought, anyway. But what could I say? Pirl, she was quite off her head—still g, still shrieking, still saying as how her father would e, would take the child, would make her hate her own mothers name. &quot;Oh, how  I save her?&quot; she said. &quot;I would rather a her, than him and my brother! Oh, what  I do? How  I save her? Oh, Mrs Sucksby, I swear to you now, I would rather they took any other poor womans baby, than mine!&quot;

    Her voice has risen. Her cheek is flushed. A pulse beats, briefly—very fast—in the lid of her eye. She puts her hand to it, then drinks again, and again wipes her mouth.

    Thats what she said, she says, more quietly. Thats what she said. And as she says it, all the infants that are lying about the house seem to hear her, and all start up g at ohey all sound the same, when you aint their mother. They all souhe same to her, anyway. I had got her to the stairs, just outside that door—she tilts her head, Richard shifts his pose and the dives a creak—and now, she stops. She looks at me, and I see what shes thinking, and my heart goes cold. &quot;We t!&quot; I say. &quot;Why t we?&quot; she answers. &quot;You have said yourself, my daughter shall be brought up a lady. Why not let some other little motherless girl have that, in her place—poor thing, she shall have the grief of it, too! But I swear, Ill settle a half my fortune on her; and Susan shall have the rest. She shall have it, if youll only take her for me now, and bring her up ho, and keep her from knowing about her iaill she has grown up poor and  feel the worth of it! Dont you have,&quot; she says, &quot;some motherless baby we  give to my father in Susans place? Dont you? Dont you? Fods sake, say you do! Theres fifty pounds in the pocket of my gown. You shall have it!— I shall send you more!—if youll only do this thing for me, and not tell a living soul youve do.&quot;

    Perhaps there is movement in the room below, ireet—I do not know, I do not hear it if there is. I keep my gaze on Mrs Sucksbys flushed face, on her eyes, her lips.—Now, here was a thing, she is saying, to be asked to do. Wouldnt you say, dear girl? Here was a thing, all right. I think I hought harder or quicker before in all my life. And what I said at last was: &quot;Keep your money. Keep your fifty pounds. I dont want it. What I want, is this: Your pa is a gentleman, as are tricky. Ill keep your baby, but I want for you to write me out a paper, saying all you mean to do, and signing it, and sealing it; and that makes it binding.&quot; &quot;Ill do it!&quot; she says, straight off. &quot;Ill do it!&quot; And we e in here, and I fetch her a bit of paper and ink, and she sets it all down—just as I have told you, that Susan Lilly is her own child, though left with me, and that the fortunes are to be cut, and so on—and she folds it and seals it with the ring off her finger, and puts on the front that it aint to be opeill the day her daughter tureen. Twenty-one, she wao make it: but my mind was running ahead, even as she was writing, and I said it must be eighteen—for we oughtnt to risk the girls taking husbands, before they knew what was what. She smiles. She liked that. She thanked me for it.

    And then, no sooner had she sealed it than Mr Ibbs sends up a cry: theres a coach, pulled up at his shop door, with two gents—an old one, and a younger—getting out, and with them, a bully with a club. Well! The lady runs shrieking to her room and I stand, tearing the hair out of my head. Then I go to the cribs, and I fetch up this one particular baby that is there—a girl, same size as the other, looks to turn out fair, like her—and I carry her upstairs. I said, &quot;Here! Take her quick, and be kind to her! Her names Maud; and thats a name for a lady after all. Remember your word.&quot; &quot;Remember yours!&quot; the pirl cries; and she kisses her own baby, and I take it, and bring it down and lay it in the empty cot. . .

    She shakes her head. Such a trifling little thing it was to do! she says.—And done in a minute. Done, while the gentlemeill hammering at the door. &quot;Where is she?&quot; theyre g. &quot;We know youve got her!&quot; No stopping them, then. Mr Ibbs lets them in, they fly through the house like furies—see me and knock me dow

    thing I know, theres the poor lady being dragged downstairs by her

    pa—her gown all flapping, her shoes uhe mark of her

    brothers sti her fad theres you, dear girl—theres you in her arms, and nobody thinking you was anyones but hers.— Why should they? Too late to ge it, then. She gave me one quick look as her father took her down, and that was all; I fancy she watched me, though, from the window of the coach. But if she was ever sorry she do, I t tell you. I dare say she thought often of Sue; but no more than— Well, no more than she ought.

    She blinks and turns her head. She has placed her glass of brandy upon the bed between us; the seams in the quilt keep it from spilling. Her hands she has clasped: she is stroking the knuckles of oh the bluhumb of the other. Her foot in its slipper goes tap upon the floor. She has not taken her eyes from my face, all the time she has spoken, until now.

    My own eyes I close. My hands I place before them, and I gaze into the darkhat is made by my palms. There is a sile lengthens. Mrs Sucksby leans closer.

    Dear girl, she murmurs. Wont you say a word to us? She touches my hair. Still I will not speak or move. Her hand falls. I  see this newsve dashed your spirits, rather, she says. Perhaps she gestures then to Richard, for he es and squats before me.

    You uand, Maud, he says, trying to see about my fingers, what Mrs Sucksby has told you? One baby bees another. Your mother was not your mother, your u your uncle. Your life was not the life that you were meant to live, but Sues; and Sue lived yours ...&quot;

    They say that dying men see, played before their eyes with impossible swiftness, the show of their lives. As Richard speaks, I see mihe madhouse, my baton of wood, the gripping gowns of Briar, the string of beads, my uncles naked eyes, the books, the books ... The show flickers and is gone, is lost and useless, like the gleam of a  in murky water. I shudder, and Richard sighs. Mrs Sucksby shakes her head and tuts. But, when I show them my face they both start back. I am not weeping, as they suppose. I am laughing—I am gripped with a terrible laughter-—and my look must be ghastly.

    Oh, but this, I think I say, is perfect! This is all I have longed for! Why do you stare? What are you gazing at? Do you suppose a girl is sitting here? That girl is lost! She has been drowned! She is lying, fathoms deep. Do you think she has arms and legs, with flesh and cloth upon them? Do you think she has hair? She has only bones, stripped white! She is as white as a page of paper! She is a book, from which the words have peeled and drifted—

    I try to take a breath; and might as well have water in my mouth: I draw at the air, and it does not e. I gasp, and shake and gasp again. Richard stands and watches.

    No madness, Maud, he says, with a look of distaste. Remember. You have no excuse for it now. I have excuse, I say, for anything! Anything! Dear girl— says Mrs Sucksby. She has caught up her tumbler of liquor and is waving it close to my face. Dear girl— But I shudder with laughter still—a hideous laughter—and I jerk, as a fish might jerk on the end of a line. I hear Richard curse; then I see him go to my bag and grope i, bring out my bottle of medie: he lets the liquid drop, three times, into the glass of brandy, then seizes my head and presses the glass to my lips. I taste it, then swallow and cough. I put my hands to my mouth. My mouth grows numb. I y eyes again. I do not know how long I sit, but at length I feel the blahat covers the bed e against my shoulder and cheek. I have sunk upon it. I lie—still twitg, from time to time, in what feels like laughter; and again Richard and Mrs Sucksby stand, in silence, and watch me.

    Presently, however, they e a little nearer. Now, says Mrs Sucksby softly, are you better, darling? I do not answer. She looks at Richard. Oughto go, a her sleep?

    Sleep be damned, he answers. I still believe she thinks we have brought her here for her own venience. He es, and taps my face. Open your eyes, he says.

    I say, I have no eyes. How could I? You have taken them from me.

    He catches hold of one of my lids and pi hard. Open your damn eyes! he says. Thats better. Now, there is a little more

    for you to know—just a little more, and then you may sleep. Listen to me. Listen! Dont ask me, how you are meant to, I shall cut the fug ears off the sides of your head if you do. Yes, I see you hear that. Do you feel this, also? He strikes me. Very good.

    The blow is not so hard as it might have been: Mrs Sucksby has seen him lift his arm and tried to check it.

    Gentleman! she says, her cheek growing dark. No call for that. No call at all. Hold your temper, t you? I believe youve bruised her. Oh, dear girl.

    She reaches towards my face. Richard scowls. She ought to be grateful, he says, straightening, putting back his hair, that I have not done worse, any time in the past three months. She ought to know I will do it again, and t it nothing. Do you hear me, Maud? You have see Briar, a sort of gentleman. I make a holiday from gallantry, however, when I e here. Uand?

    I lie, nursing my cheek, my eyes on his, saying nothing. Mrs Sucksby wrings her hands. He takes the cigarette from behind his ear, puts it to his mouth, looks for a match.

    Go on, Mrs Sucksby, he says as he does it. Tell the rest. As for you, Maud: listen hard, and know at last what your life was lived for.

    My life was not lived, I say in a whisper. You have told me, it was a fi.

    Well—he finds a match, and strikes it—fiust end. Hear now how yours is to.

    It has ended already, I answer. But his words have made me cautious. My head is thick with liquor, with medie, with shock; but not so thick that I ot, now, begin to be fearful of what they will tell me , how they plan to keep me, what they mean to keep me for ...

    Mrs Sucksby sees me grow thoughtful, and nods. Now you start to get it, she says. You are starting to see. I got the ladys baby and, whats better, I got the ladys word.—The words the thing, of course. The words the thing with the money in—aint it? She smiles, touches her hen she leans a little closer. Like to see it? she says, in a different sort of voice. Like to see the ladys word?

    She waits. I do not answer, but she smiles again, moves from me, gla Richard, then turns her ba and fumbles for a sed with the buttons of her gown. The taffeta rustles. When the bodice is part-en she reaches inside—reaches, it seems to me, into her very bosom, her very heart—and then draws out a folded paper. Kept this close, she says, as she brings it to me, all these years. Kept this closer than gold! Look, here.

    The paper is folded like a letter, and bears a tilting instru: To Be Opened on the Eighteenth Birthday of My Daughter, Susan Lilly.—I see that name, and shudder, and reach, but she holds it jealously and, like my u my uncle, now!—with an antique book, wo me take it; she lets me touch it, however. The paper is warm, from the heat of her breast. The ink is brown, the folds furred and discoloured. The seal is quite unbroken. The stamp is my mothers—Sues mothers, I mean; not mine, not mine—

    M.L.

    You see it, dear girl? Mrs Sucksby says. The paper trembles. She draws it back to herself, with a misers gesture and look—lifts it to her fad puts her lips to it, then turns her bad restores it to its plaside her gown. As she buttons her dress, she glances again at Richard. He has been watg, closely, curiously; but says nothing.

    I speak, instead. She wrote it, I say. My voice is thick, I am giddy. She wrote it. They took her. What then?

    Mrs Sucksby turns. Her gown is closed and perfectly smooth again, but she has her hand upon the bodice, as if nursing the words beh. The lady? she says, distractedly. The lady died, dear girl. She sniffs, aone ges. Bust me, however, if she didnt linger on another month before she do! Who would have thought? That month was against us. For now her pa and her brother, having got her home, made her ge her will.—You  guess what to. No penny to go to the daughter—meaning you, dear girl, so far as they kill the daughter marries. Theres gentlemen for you—aint it? She sent me a o tell me, by a heyd got her into the madhouse by then, and you alongside her— well, that soon finished her off. It uzzle to her, she said, how things might turn out now; but she took her solation from the

    thought of my hoy. Pirl! She seems almost sorry.—That was her slip.

    Richard laughs. Mrs Sucksby smooths her mouth, and begins to look crafty. As for me, she says, —well, I had seen from the first that the only puzzle was, how to get the whole of the fortune when I was only due to have half. My ust be, that I had eighteen years furing it out in. I thought many times of you.

    I turn my face. I never asked for your thoughts, I say. I dont want them now.

    Ungrateful, Maud! says Richard. Here has Mrs Sucksby been, plotting so hard in your behalf, so long. Anirl—dont girls seek only to be the heroines of romance?—anirl might fancy herself distinguished.

    I look from him bars Sucksby, saying nothing. She nods. I thought often of you, she says again, and wondered how you got on. I supposed you handsome. Dear girl, you are! She swallows. I had two fears, only. The first was, that you might die. The sed was, that yrand-dad and uncle should take you away from England and have you married before the ladys secret e out. Then I read in a paper that yrand-dad died. Then I heard how your uncle lived quietly, in the try; and had you with him, a you in a quiet way, too. Theres my two fears both gone! She smiles. Meanwhile, she says—and now her eyelids flutter—Meanwhile, heres Sue. You have seen, dear girl, how close and quiet I have kept the ladys word. She pats her gown. Well, what was the word to me, without Sue to pin it to? Think how close and quiet I have kept her. Think how safe. Think ho such a girl might have grown, in a house like this one, in a street like ours; then think how hard Mr Ibbs and me have worked to keep her blunt. Think how deep I puzzled it over— knowing I must use her at the last, but never quite knowing how. Think how it begins to e clear, when I meets Gentleman— think how quick my fear that you might be secretly married, turns into my knowing that he is the chap that must secretly marry you . . . Its the work of another mihen, to look at Sue and know what ought to be doh her. She shrugs. Well, and

    now weve do. Sues you, dear girl. And what we brought you here for is—

    Listen, Maud! says Richard. I have closed my eyes and turned my head. Mrs Sucksby es to me, lifts her hand, begins to stroke my hair.

    What we brought you here for, she goes on, mently, is for you to start being Sue. Only that, dear girl! Only that.

    I open my eyes, and suppose look stupid.

    Do you see? says Richard. We keep Sue as my wife in the madhouse, and with the opening of her mothers statement, her share of the fortune—Mauds share, I mean—es to me. I should like to say I will keep every t of it; but the scheme was Mrs Sucksbys after all, and half goes to her. He makes a bow.

    Thats fair, aint it? says Mrs Sucksby, still stroking my hair.

    But the other share, Richard goes on, —which is to say, Sues real share—Mrs Sucksby stands also to get. The statement names her Sues guardian; and guardians, I am afraid, are oftehan scrupulous in the handling of their wards fortunes . . . That all means nothing, of course, if Sue herself has vanished. But then, its Maud Lilly—the true Maud Lilly—he blinks—by which I mean of course, the false Maud Lilly—who has vanished. Isnt that what you wao vanish? You said, a minute ago, that you have excuse for anything now. What will it hurt you, then, to be passed off as Sue, and so make Mrs Sucksby rich?

    Make us both rich, darling, Mrs Sucksby says quickly. I aint so heartless, dear, as to rob you quite of everything! Youre a lady, aint you, and handsome? Why, I shall need a handsome lady, to show me whats what when I es into my fortune. I got plans for us both, sweetheart, that grand!—She taps her nose.

    I push myself up, away from her; but am too giddy, still, to stand. You are mad, I say to them both. You are mad! I— Pass me off as Sue?

    Why not? says Richard. We need only vince a lawyer. I think we shall.

    vince him, how?

    How? Why, here are Mrs Sucksby and Mr Ibbs—that have been

    like parents to you, and so might be supposed, I think, to know you, if anyone might. And here are John and Dainty, too—theyll swear to any kind of mischief with money in, you may be sure. And here am I—that met you at Briar, when you were maid to Miss Maud Lilly, later my wife. Youve seen, havent you, what gentlemens words are worth? He pretends to be struck with the thought. But of course you have! For in a madhouse in the try are a pair of doctors—theyll remember you, I think. For didnt you, only yesterday, give them your hand and make them a curtsey, and stand in a good light before them, for quite twenty minutes, answering questions to the name of Susan?

    He lets me sider that. Then he says, All we ask is that, when the moment arrives, you give the performance ain, before a lawyer. What have you to lose? Dear Maud, you have nothing: no friends in London, no moo your name—why, not so much as a name!

    I have put my fio my mouth. Suppose, I say, I wont do it? Suppose, when your lawyer es, I tell him—

    Tell him what? Tell him how you plotted to swindle an i girl?—looked on, while the doctors dosed her and carried her off? Hmm? What do you think he will make of that?

    I sit and watch him speak. At last I say, in a whisper: Are you truly so wicked as this? He shrugs. I turn to Mrs Sucksby. And you, I say. Are you so wicked? To think, of Sue— Are you so vile?

    She waves her hand before her face, says nothing. Richard snorts. Wiess, he says. Vileness. What terms! The terms of fi. Do you think, that when women s children, they do it, as nurses do it in the operettas—for edys sake? Look about you, Maud. Step to the window, look into the street. There is life, not fi. It is hard, it is wretched. It would have been yours, but for Mrs Sucksbys kindness in keeping you from it.—Christ! He moves from the door, puts his arms above his head and stretches. How tired I am! What a days work I have dooday—havent I? One girl pressed into a madhouse; another— Well. He looks me over, nudges my foot with his. Numents? he says. No bluster? That may e later, I suppose. No matter if it does. Sues birthday

    falls at the start of August. We have more than three months, to persuade you into our plot. I think three days—of Bh living, I mean—will do that.

    I am gazing at him, but ot speak. I am thinking, still, of Sue. He tilts his head. Dont say we have broken your spirit, Maud, he says, so quickly? I should be sorry to think it. He pauses. Then: Your mother, he adds, would have been sorry, also.

    My mother, I start to say.—I think of Marianne, with luna her eye. Then I catch my breath. Through all of it, I have not thought of this. Richard watches, looks sly. He puts his hand to his collar and stretches his throat, and coughs, in a feeble, girlish a deliberate kind of way.

    Now, Gentleman, says Mrs Sucksby anxiously as he does it, dont tease her.

    Tease her? he says. He still pulls at his collar as if it chafes him. I am only dry about the throat, from talking.

    You have said too much, thats why, she answers. Miss Lilly—Ill call you that, shall I, my dear? Seems natural, dont it?—Miss Lilly, dont mind him. Weve plenty of time for talking of that.

    Of my mother, you mean, I say. My true mother, that you made out to be Sues. That choked—you see, I know something!— that choked, on a pin.

    On a pin! says Richard, laughing. Did Sue say that? Mrs Sucksby bites her mouth. I look from oo the other of them.

    What was she? I ask wearily. Fods sake, tell me. Do you think I have it in me, now, to be astonished? Do you imagine I care? What was she? A thief, like you? Well, if I must lose the madwoman, a thief I suppose will do . . .

    Richard coughs again. Mrs Sucksby looks away from me, and joins and works her hands. When she speaks, her voice is quiet, grave. Gentleman, she says, you aint got nothing more to tell Miss Lilly, now. I have some words, however. The sort of words a lady likes to say to a girl in private.

    He nods. I know, he says. He folds his arms. I am dying to hear them.

    She waits, but he will not leave. She es and, again, sits beside me; again, I flinch away.

    Dear girl, she says. The fact of it is, there aint a pleasant way to tell it; and I ought to know, if anyone ought!—for I told it once already, to Sue. Your mother— She wets her lips, then looks at Richard.

    Tell her, he says. Or I will.

    So then she speaks again, more quickly. Your mother, she says, was took before the courts, not just for thieving, but for killing a man; and—oh, my dear, they hanged her for it!

    Hanged?

    A murderess, Maud, says Richard, with relish. You may see the place they hanged her, from the window of my room—

    Gentleman, I mean it!

    He falls silent. I say again, Hanged!

    Hanged game, says Mrs Sucksby—as if this, whatever it means, will make me bear it better. Theudies my face. Dear girl, dont think of it, she says. What does it matter now? Youre a lady, aint you? Wholl trouble with where you e from? Why, look about you here.

    She has risen, and lights a lamp: a score of gaudy surfaces—the silk dressing-gown, the cloudy brass of the bedstead, a ors upon the mantel-shelf—start out of the darkness. She goes again to the wash-hand stand, and again she says: Heres soap. What soap! Got from a shop up West. e in a year ago—I saw it e and thought, &quot;Now, shant Miss Lilly like that!&quot; Kept it ed in paper, all this time. And heres a towel, look—got a nap like a peach. And st! Dont care for lavender, well get you one of rose. Are you looking, dear? She moves to the chest of drawers, pulls the deepest drawer open. Why, what have we here! Richard leans to see. I also look, in a kind of horrified wonder. Petticoats, and stogs, and stays! Bless me, heres pins for a ladys hair. Heres rouge for a ladys cheek. Heres crystal drops— one pair of blue, ohat es of my not knowing, darling, the shade of the eyes they was to match! Well, Dainty shall have the blue pair . . .

    She holds the gaudy beads up by their wires, and I watch the crystals turn. The colour seems to blur. I have begun, in hopelessness, to weep.

    As if weeping could save me.

    Mrs Sucksby sees me, and tuts. Oh, now, she says, aint that a shame! g? And all these handsome things? Gentleman, you see her? g, and for what?

    g, I say bitterly, unsteadily, to find myself here, like this! g to think of the dream I lived in, when I supposed my mother only a fool! g in horror at the closeness and foulness of you!

    She has stepped back. Dear girl, she says, dropping her voice, gazing quickly at Richard, do you despise me so, for letting them take you?

    I despise you, I say, fing me back!

    She stares, then almost smiles. She gestures about the room. Dont think, she says, with a look of amazement, I mean for you to keep at Lant Street! Dear girl, dear girl, you was taken from here so they might make a lady of you. And a lady theyve made you— a perfect jewel! Dont think I shall have you wasting your shine in this low place. Havent I said? I want you by me, dear, when I am rich. Dont ladies take panions? Only wait till I have got my hands on your fortuhen see if we dont take the gra house in London! See what carriages and footmen well have then!—earls, what dresses!

    She puts her hands on me again. She means to kiss me, to eat me. I rise and shake her off. You dont think, I say, I shall stay with you, when your wretched scheme is done?

    What else? she says. Who ought to have you, if not me? It was fortuook you; it is me that has got you back. I been w it over for seventeen years. I been plotting and thinking on this, every minute since I first laid you in the poor ladys arms. I been looking at Sue—

    She swallows. I cry still harder. Sue, I say. Oh, Sue . . .

    Now, why look like that? Didnt I do everything for her, just as her mother wanted?—kept her safe, kept her tidy, made a onplace

    girl of her? What have I done, but give her back the life you had from

    her?

    You have killed her! I say.

    Killed her? When theres all those doctors about her, all sup-nosing her a lady?—And that dont e cheap, I  tell you.

    It certainly doesnt, says Richard. Youre paying for that, dont fet. I should have had her in the ty asylum, were it down to

    me.

    You see, dear girl? Killed her! Why, she might have been killed any day of her life, but for me! Who was it nursed her, wheook sick? Who kept the boys off her? I should have given my hands, my legs, my lungs, for the saving of hers. But do you think, that when I did those things I was doing them for her? What use will a onplace girl be to me, when I am rich? I was doing them for you! Dont think of her. She was water, she was coal, she was dust, in parison with whats been made of you.

    I stare at her. My God! I say. How could you? How could you?

    Again, she looks amazed. How could I not?

    But, to cheat her! To leave her, there—!

    She reaches, and pats my sleeve. You let them take her, she says. Then her look ges. She almost winks. And oh, dear girl, dont you think you was your mothers daughter, then?

    From the rooms below there e again shrieks, and blows, and laughter. Richard stands watg, with folded arms. The fly at the window still buzzes, still beats against the glass. Then the buzzing stops. As if it is a signal, I turn, and sink out of Mrs Sucksbys grasp. I sink to my k the side of the bed, and hide my fa the seams of the quilt. I have been bold aermined. I have bitten de, insanity, desire, love, for the sake of freedom. Now, that freedom being taken from me utterly, is it to be wo if I fancy myself defeated?

    I give myself up to darkness; and wish I may never again be required to lift my head to the light.

 Chapter Thirteen

    The night which follows I remember brokenly. I remember that  <df</dfn>I keep at the side of the bed with my eyes quite hidden, and will not rise and go down to the kit, as Mrs Sucksby wishes. I remember that Richard es to me, and again puts his shoe to my skirts, to nudge me, then stands and laughs when I will not stir, then leaves me. I remember that someone brings me soup, which I will . That the lamp is taken away and the room made dark. That I must rise at last, to visit the privy; and that the red-haired, fat-faced girl—Dainty—is made to show me to it, then stands at the door to keep me from running from it into the night. I remember that I weep again, and am given more of my drops in brandy. That I am undressed and put in a night-gown not my own. That I sleep, perhaps for an hour—that I am woken by the rustling of taffeta— that I look in horror to see Mrs Sucksby with her hair let down, shrugging off her gown, unc flesh and dirty linen, snuffing out her dle, then climbing into the bed beside me. I remember

    that she lies, thinking me sleeping—puts her hands to me, then draws them back—finally, like a miser with a piece of gold, catches up a loy hair and presses it to her mouth.

    I know that I am scious of the heat of her, the unfamiliar bulk and sour sts of her. I know that she falls swiftly into an even sleep, and snores, while I start in and out of slumber. The fitful sleeping makes the hours pass slowly: it seems to me the night has many nights in it—has years of nights!—through which, as if through drifts of smoke, I am pelled to stumble. I wake now, believing I am in my dressing-room at Briar; now, in my room at Mrs Creams; now, in a madhouse bed, with a nurse vast and fortable beside me. I wake, a huimes. I wake to moan and long for slumber—for always, at the last, es the remembrance, sharp and fearful, of where I truly lie, how I arrived there, who and what I am.

    At last I wake and do not sleep again. The dark has eased a little. There has been a street-lamp burning, that has lit the threads of the bleached  scarf hung at the window; now it is put out. The light turns filthy pink. The pink gives way, in time, to a sickly yellow. It creeps, and with it creeps sound—softly at first, then rising in a staggering cresdo: crowing cocks, whistles and bells, dogs, shrieking babies, violent calling, coughing, spitting, the tramp of feet, the endless hollow beating of hooves and the grinding of wheels. Up, up it es, out of the throat of London. It is six or seven oclock. Mrs Sucksby sleeps on at my side, but I am wide awake now, and wretched, and sick at my stomach. I rise, and— though it is May, and milder here than at Briar—I shiver. I still wear my gloves, but my clothes and shoes aher bag Mrs Sucksby has locked in a box—In case you should wake bewildered, darling, and, thinking you was at home, get dressed, walk off and be lost.— I remember her saying it, now, as I stood dosed and dazed before her. Where did she put the key?—and the key to the door of the room? I shiver again, more violently, and grow sicker than ever; but my thoughts are horribly clear. I must get out. I must get out! I must get out of London—go anywhere—back to Briar. I must get money. / must, I think—this is the clearest thought of all—/ must get

    Sue! Mrs Sucksby breathes heavily, evenly. Where might she have put the keys? Her taffeta gown is hanging from the horse-hair s: I go silently to it and pat the pockets of its skirt. Empty. I stand and study the shelves, the chest of drawers, the mantelpieo keys; but many places, I suppose, where they might be cealed.

    Theirs—does not wake, but moves her head; and I think I know—think I begin to remember . . . She has the keys beh her pillow: I recall the crafty movement of her hand, the muffled ringing of the metal. I take a step. Her lips are parted, her white hair loose upon her cheek. I step again, and the floorboards creak. I stand at her side—wait a moment, uain; then put my fingers beh the edge of pillow and slowly, slowly, reach.

    She opens her eyes. She takes my wrist, and smiles. She coughs.

    My dear, I loves you f, she says, wiping her mouth. But the girl aint been born thats got the touch that will get past me, when Ive a mind to something. Her grip is strong about my arm; though turns to a caress. I shudder. Lord, aint you cold! she says then. Here, sweetheart, let us cover you up. She pulls the knitted quilt from the bed and puts it about me. Better, dear girl?

    My hair is tangled, and has fallen before my face. I regard her through it.

    I wish I were dead, I say.

    Oh, now, she answers, rising. What kind of talk is that?

    I wish you were dead, then.

    She shakes her head, still smiles. Wild words, dear girl! She sniffs. There has e, from the kit, a terrible odour. Smell that? Thats Mr Ibbs, a-cooking up our breakfasts. Lets see who wishes she was dead, now, thats got a plate of bloaters before her!

    She rubs her hands again. Her hands are red, but the sagging flesh upon her arms has the hue and polish of ivory. She has slept in her chemise aicoat; now she hooks on a pair of stays, climbs into her taffeta gown, then es to dip her b in water and brush her hair. Tra la, hee hee, she sings brokenly, as she

    does it. I keep my own tangled hair before my eyes, and watch her. Her naked feet are cracked, and bulge at the toe. Her legs are almost hairless. When she bends to her stogs, she groans. Her thighs are fat and permaly marked by the pinch of her garters.

    There, now, she says, when she is dressed. A baby has started g. That will set my others all off. e down, dear girl—will you?—while I give em their pap.

    e down? I say. I must go down, if I am to escape. But I look at myself. Like this? Wont you give me back my gown, my shoes?

    Perhaps I say it too keenly, however; or else my look has something of ing, or desperation, in it. She hesitates, then says, That dusty old frock? Them boots? Why, thats walking-gear. Look here, at this silken er. She takes up the dressing-gown from the hook on the back of the door. Heres what ladies wear, for their ms at home. Heres silken slippers, too. Shant you look well, in these? Slip em on, dear girl, and e down for your breakfast. o be shy. John Vroom dont rise before twelve, theres only me, aleman—hes seen you in a state of dishabilly, I suppose!—and Mr Ibbs. And him, dear girl, you might sider now in the light of—well, lets say an uncle. Eh?

    I turn away. The room is hateful to me; but I will not go with her, undressed, down to that dark kit. She pleads and coaxes a little lohen gives me up, and goes. The key turns in the lock.

    I step at oo the box that holds my clothes, to try the lid. It is shut up tight, and is stout.

    So then I go to the window, to push at the sashes. They will lift, by an inch or two, and the rusting nails that keep them shut I think might give, if I pushed harder. But then, the window frame is narrow, the drop is great; and I am still undressed. Worse than that, the street has people in it; and though at first I think to call to them—to break the glass, to signal and shriek—after a sed I begin to look more closely at them, and I see their faces, their dusty clothes, the packets they carry, the children and dogs that run and tumble at their sides. There is life, said Richard, twelve ho. It

    is hard, it is wretched. It would have been yours, but for Mrs Sucksbys kindness in keeping you from it. . .

    At the door to the house with the shutters with the heart-shaped holes, a girl in a dirty bas and feeds her baby. She lifts her head, catches my gaze; and shakes her fist at me.

    I start back from the glass, and cover my face up with my hands.

    When Mrs Sucksby es again, however, I am ready.

    Listen to me, I say, going to her. You know that Richard took me away from my uncles house? You know my uncle is rich, and will seek me out?

    Your uncle? she says. She has brought me a tray, but stands in the door-platil I move back.

    Mr Lilly, I say, as I do it. You know who I meaill thinks me his  least. Dont you suppose he will send a man, and find me? Do you think he will thank you, for keeping me like this?

    I should say he will-—if he cares so much about it. Aint we made you cosy, dear?

    You know you have not. You know you are keeping me here against my will. Fods sake, give me my gown, wont you?

    All right, Mrs Sucksby?—It is Mr Ibbs. My voice has risen, and has brought him out of the kit to the foot of the stairs. Richard, too, has stirred in his bed: I hear him cross his floor, draw open his door, and listen.

    All right! calls Mrs Sucksby lightly. There, now, she says to me. And heres your breakfast, look, growing chilly.

    She sets the tray upon the bed. The door is open; but I know that Mr Ibbs still stands at the foot of the stairs, that Richard waits and listens at the top. There, now, she says again. The tray has a plate and a fork upon it, and a linen napkin. Upon the plate there are two or three amber-coloured fish in a juice of butter and water. They have fins, and faces. About the napkin there is a ring of polished silver, a little like the ohat was kept for my especial use at Briar; but without the initial.

    Please let me go, I say.

    Mrs Sucksby shakes her head. Dear girl, she says, go where?

    She waits and, when I do not answer, leaves me. Richard closes his door and goes back to his bed. I hear him humming.

    I think of taking up the plate, hurling it against the ceiling, the window, the wall. Then I think: You must be strong. You must be strong and ready to run. And so I sit a—slowly, wretchedly, carefully pig out the bones from the amber flesh. My gloves gro and stained; and I have h which to replace them.

    After an hour, Mrs Sucksby es back, to take the empty plate. Another hour, and she brings me coffee. While she is gone I stand, again, at the window, or press my ear to the door. I pace, and sit, and pace again. I pass from fury to maudlin grief, to stupor. But then Richard es. Well, Maud— is all he says. I see him, and am filled with a blistering rage. I make a run at him, meaning to strike his face: he wards off the blows and knocks me down, and I lie upon the floor and kick, and kick—

    Then they dose me again with medie and brandy; and a day or two passes in darkness.

    When I wake , it is again unnaturally early. There has appeared in the room a little basket chair, painted gold, with a scarlet cushion on it. I take it to the window and sit with the dressing-gown about me, until Mrs Sucksby yawns and opens her eyes.

    Dear girl, all right? she says, as she will say every day, every day; and the idiocy or perversity of the question—when all is so far from being right, as to be s I would almost rather die than e—prompts me to grind my teeth or pull at my hair, and gaze at her in loathing. Good girl, she says then, and, Like your chair, do you, dear? I supposed you would. She yawns again, and looks about her. Got the po? she says. I am used in my modesty to taking the chamber-pot behind the horse-hair s. Pass it over, will you, sweetheart? Im ready to bust.

    I do not move. After a sed she rises aches it herself. It is a thing of white a, dark ih what, when I saw it first, in the half-light of m, I queasily took to be clumps of hair; but

    which proved to be decoration merely—a great eye with lashes, and about it, in a plain black fount, a motto:

    use me well and keep me  and ill not tell of what ive seen!

    a present from wales

    The eye gives me, always, a moment or two of uneasiness; but Mrs Sucksby sets the pot down and carelessly lifts her skirt, and stoops. When I shudder, she makes a face.

    Not nice, is it, dear? Never mind. We shall have you a closet, in rand house.

    She straightens, pushes her petticoat between her legs. Then she rubs her hands.

    Now, then, she says. She is looking me over, and her eyes are gleaming. What do you say to this? How about we dress you up today, make you look handsome? Theres your own gown in the box. But, its a dull old thing, aint it? And queer and old-fashioned? How about we try you in something nicer. I got dresses saved for you—got em ed in silver-paper—that fine, you wont believe it. What say we bring Dainty in a em fitted up? Daintys clever with a needle, though she seems sh—dont she? Thats just her way. She was what you would say, nht up, but dragged up. But she is kind at her heart.

    She has my attention, now. Dresses, I think. Once I am dressed, I might escape.

    She sees the ge in me, and is pleased. She brings me another breakfast of fish, and agai it. She brings me coffee, sweet as syrup: it makes my heart beat hard. Then she brings me a  of hot water. She wets a towel and tries to wash me. I will not let her, but take the towel from her, press it against my face, under my arms, between my legs.—The first time, in all my life, that I washed myself.

    Then she goes off—locks the door, of course, behind her—es back with Dainty. They are carrying paper boxes. They set them

    down upon the bed, uheir strings and draw out gowns. Dainty sees them, and screams. The gowns are all of silk: one of violet, with yellow ribbon trimming it, another of green with a silver stripe, and a third of crimson. Dainty takes up an edge of cloth and strokes it.

    Pongee? she says, as if in wonder.

    Pongee, with a foulard rouche, says Mrs Sucksby—the words ing awkwardly, fleshily out of her mouth, like cherry stones. She lifts the crimson skirt, her  and cheeks as red in the reflected light of the silk as if stained with coeal.

    She catches my eye. What do you say, my dear, to these?

    I have not known such colours, such fabrics, such gow. I imagine myself in them, uporeets of London. My heart has sunk. I say, They are hideous, hideous.

    She blinks, then recovers. You say that now. But you beeoo long in that dreary great house of your uncles. Is it to be wo if youve no more idea of fashion, than a bat? When you makes your debut, dear girl, upoown, you shall have a set of dresses so gay, you shall look ba these and laugh your head off to think you ever supposed em bright. She rubs her hands. Now, which best takes your fancy? The arsenic green and the silver?

    Havent you a grey, I say, or a brown, or a black?

    Dainty looks at me in disgust.

    Grey, brown or black? says Mrs Sucksby. When theres silver here, and violet?

    Make it the violet, then, I say at last. I think the stripe will blihe crimson make me sick; though I am sick, anyway. Mrs Sucksby goes to the chest of drawers and opens it up. She brings out stogs, and stays, and coloured petticoats. The petticoats astonish me: for I have always supposed that linen must be white—just as, when I was a child, I thought that all black books must turn out Bibles.

    But I must be coloured now, o hey dress me, like two girls dressing a doll.

    Now, where must we nip it? says Mrs Sucksby, studying the gown. Hold still, my dear, while Dainty takes her measure. Lord,

    look at your waist.—Hold steady! A person dont want tle while Daintys by with a pin in her hand, I  tell you.—Thats better. Too loose, is it? Well, we t be particular about the size— ha, ha!—the way we gets em.

    They take away my gloves; but bring me new ones. On my feet they put white silk slippers. May I not wear shoes? I say, and Mrs Sucksby answers: Shoes? Dear girl, shoes are for walking in. Whereve you got to walk to . . .?

    She says it distractedly. She has opened up the great wooden box and brought out my leather bag. Now, as I look on, and while Dainty stitches, she goes with it to the light of the window, makes herself fortable in the creaking basket chair, and begins to sort through the items inside. I watch as she fingers slippers, playing-cards, bs. Its my jewels she wants, however. She finds in time the little linen packet, uns it and tips the tents into her lap.

    Now, whats here? A ring. A bangle. A ladys picture. She gazes at this in an assessing way; then all at once her expression ges. I know whose features she is seeing there, upon the face where once I looked for mine. She puts it quickly aside. A bracelet of emeralds, she says , in fashion at the time of King Gee; but with handsome stones. We shall find you a nice price for those. A pearl on a . A ruby necklace—thats too heavy, that is, firl with your looks. I got you a  of beads—glass beads, but with such a shine, youd swear they was sapphires!—suit you much better. And— Oh! Whats this? Aint that a beauty? Look Dainty, look at the stunning great stones in that!

    Dainty looks. What a spanker! she says.

    It is the brooch of brilliants I once imagined Sue breathing upon, and polishing, and gazing at with a squinting eye. Now Mrs Sucksby holds it up and studies it with her own eye narrowed. It sparkles. It sparkles, even here.

    I know the place for this, she says. Dear girl, you wont mind? She opens its clasp and pins it to the bosom of her gown. Dainty <dfn></dfs fall her needle and thread, to watch her.

    Oh, Mrs S! she says. You looks like a regular queen.

    My heart beats hard again. The Queen of Diamonds, I say. She eyes me uainly—not knowing if I mean to pliment or mock. I do not know, myself.

    For a time, then, we say nothing. Dainty finishes her work, then bs my hair and twists and pins it into a knot. Then they make me stand, so they might survey me. They look expet, tilt their heads; but their faces fall. Dainty rubs her nose. Mrs Sucksby drums her fingers across her lips, and frowns.

    There is a square of glass upon the ey-piece, with plaster hearts about it: I turn, and see what I y fad figure, in that. I barely reise myself. My mouth is white. My eyes are swollen and red, my cheeks the texture and colour of yellowing flannel. My unwashed hair is dark with grease at the scalp. The neck of the gown is low, and shows the lines and points of the bones about my throat.

    Perhaps violet, after all, says Mrs Sucksby, aint the colour for you, dear girl. Brings out the shadows under your eyes and makes em seem rather too like bruises. And as for your cheek—what say you give it a bit of a pinch, put the roses ba it? No? Let Dainty try for you then. Shes got a grip like thunder, she has.

    Dainty es and seizes my cheek, and I cry out and twist from her grasp.

    All right, you cat! she says, tossing her head and stamping. Im sure, you  keep your yellow face!

    Hi! Hi! says Mrs Sucksby. Miss Lilly is a lady! I want her spoke to like one. You put that lip in. Dainty has begun to pout. Thats better. Miss Lilly, how about we take the gown off and try the green and silver? Only a touch of arseni that green—wont harm you at all, so long as you keep from sweating too hard in the bodice.

    But I ot bear to be handled again, and will not let her unfasten the violet dress. You like it, dear girl? she says then, her fad voice grown softer. There! I khe silks would bring you round at last. Now, what say we go down and stun the gents? Miss Lilly?—Dainty, you go on first. Them stairs are tricky, I should hate for Miss Lilly to take a tumble.

    She has unlocked the door. Dainty passes before me and, after a sed, I follow. I still wish I had shoes, a hat, a cloak; but I will run, bare-headed, in silken slippers, if I must. I will run, all the way to Briar. Which was the door, at the foot of the stairs, that I ought to take? I am not sure. I ot see. Dainty walks ahead of me, and Mrs Sucksby follows anxiously behind. Find your step, dear girl? she says. I do not answer. For there has e, from some room close by, araordinary sound—a sound, like the cry of a peahen, rising, then trembling, then fading to silence. I start, and turn. Mrs Sucksby has also turned. Go on, you old bird! she cries, shaking her fist. And then, to me, more sweetly: Nhtened, dear? Why, thats only Mr Ibbss aged sister, that is kept to her bed, poor thing, and proo the horrors.

    She smiles. The cry es again, I hear it and hasten down the shadowy stairs—my limbs ag and crag as I do it, and my breath ing quick. Dainty waits at the bottom. The hall is small, she seems to fill it. In here, she says. She has opehe door to the kit. There is a street-door behind her, I think, with bolts across it. I slow my step. But then Mrs Sucksby es and touches my shoulder. Thats right, dear girl. This way. I step again, and almost stumble.

    The kit is warmer than I recall, and darker. Richard and the boy, John Vroom, are sitting at the table playing at dice. They both look up when I appear, and both laugh. John says, Look at the fa that! Who bruised the eyes, then? Dainty, say it was you and Ill kiss you.

    Ill bruise your eyes, get my hands on you, says Mrs Sucksby. Miss Lilly is only tired. Get out of that chair, you little waster, a her sit down.

    She says this, log the door at her back, pocketing the key, then crossing the kit and trying the other two doors, making sure they are fast.—Keep the draughts out, she says, when she sees me watg her.

    John throws the dice again, and res up his score, before he rises. Richard pats the empty seat. e, Maud, he says. e, sit beside me. And if you will only promise not to fly at my eyes—

    as you did, you know, on Wednesday—then I shall swear, on Johnnys life! not to knock you down again.

    John scowls. Dont you make so free with my life, he says; else, I might make free with yours—you hear me?

    Richard does not answer. He holds my gaze, and smiles. e, let us be friends again, hmm?

    He puts his hand to me, and I dodge it, drawing my skirts away. The fastening of the doors, the closeness of the kit, has filled me with a kind of bleak bravado. I dont care, I say, to be thought a friend of yours. I dont care to be thought a friend to any of you. I e among you because I must; because Mrs Sucksby wills it, and I havent life left io thwart her. For the rest, remember this: I loathe you all.

    And I sit, not in the empty place beside him, but in the great rog-chair, at the head of the table. I sit in it and it creaks. John and Dainty gaze quickly at Mrs Sucksby, who blinks at me, two or three times.

    And why not? she says at last, f a laugh. You make y6ur-self fy, my dear. Ill take this hard old chair here, do me good. She sits and wipes her mouth. Mr Ibbs not about?

    Gone off on a job, says John. Took Charley Wag.

    She nods. And all my infants sleeping?

    Gentleman give em a dose, half anbbr></abbr> ho.

    Good boy, good boy. Keep it nid quiet. She gazes at me. All right, Miss Lilly? Like a spot of tea, perhaps? I do not answer, but ro my chair, very slowly. Or, coffee? She wets her lips. Make it coffee, then. Dainty, hot up some water.—Like a cake, dear girl, to chase it down with? Shall John slip out ae? Dont care for cakes?

    Theres nothing, I say slowly, that could be served to me here, that wouldo me as ashes.

    She shakes her head. Why, what a mouth youve got, for poetry! As for the cake, now—? I look away.

    Dainty sets about making the coffee. A gaudy clock ticks, and strikes the hour. Richard rolls a cigarette. Tobaoke, and smoke from the lamps and spitting dles, already drifts from wall

    to wall. The walls are brown, and faintly gleam, as if painted with gravy; they are pinned, here and there, with coloured pictures—of cherubs, of roses, of girls on swings—and with curling paper clippings, engravings of sportsmen, horses, dogs and thieves. Beside Mr Ibbss brazier three portraits—of Mr Chubb, Mr Yale and Mr Bramah—have been pasted to a board of cork; and are much marked by dart-holes.

    If I had a dart, I think, I might threaten them with it, make Mrs Sucksby give up her keys. If I had a broken bottle. If I had a knife.

    Richard lights his cigarette, narrows his eyes against the smoke and looks me over. Pretty dress, he says. Just the colour for you. He reaches for one of the yellow ribbon trimmings, and I hit his hand away. Tut, tut, he says then. Temper not much improved, I fear. We were in hopes that you would sweeten up in fi. As apples do. And veal-calves.

    Go to hell, will you? I say.

    He smiles. Mrs Sucksby colours, then laughs. Hark at that, she says. on girl says that, sounds awfully vulgar. Lady says it, sounds almost sweet. Still, dear—here she leans across the table, drops her voice—I wish you mightnt speak so nasty.

    I hold her gaze. And you think, I answer levelly, your wishes are something to me, do you?

    She flinches, and colours harder; her eyelids flutter and she looks away.

    I drink my coffee, then, and dont speak again. Mrs Sucksby sits, softly beating her hands upoable-top, her brows drawn together into a frown. John and Richard play again at dice, and quarrel over the game. Dainty washes napkins in a bowl of brown water, thehem before the fire to steam and stink. I y eyes. My stomach aches and aches. If I had a knife, I think again. Or an axe . . .

    But the room is so stiflingly hot, and I am so weary and sick, my head falls bad I sleep. When I wake, it is five oclock. The dice are put away. Mr Ibbs is returned. Mrs Sucksby is feeding babies, and Dainty is cooking a supper. Ba, cabbage, crumbling pota-

    toes and bread: they give me a plate and, miserably pig free the strips of fat from the ba, the crusts from the bread, as I pick bones from my breakfasts of fish, I eat it. Then they put out glasses. Care for some tipple, Miss Lilly? Mrs Sucksby says. A stout, or a

    sherry?

    A gin? says Richard, some look of mischief in his eye.

    I take a gin. The taste of it is bitter to me, but the sound of the silver spoon, striking the glass as it stirs, brings a vague and nameless fort.

    So that day passes. So pass the days that follow. I go early to bed— am undressed, every time, by Mrs Sucksby, who takes my goetticoats and locks them up, then locks up me. I sleep poorly, and wake, each m, sid clear-headed and afraid; and I sit itle gold chair, running over the details of my fi, w out my plan of escape. For I must escape. I will escape. Ill escape, and go to Sue. What are the names of the men who took her? I ot remember. Where is their house? I do not know. Never mind, never mind, I shall find it out. First, though, I will go to Briar, beg money from my uncle—hell still believe himself my uncle, of course—and if hell give me none, Ill beg from the servants! Ill beg from Mrs Stiles! Or, Ill steal! Ill steal a book from the library, the rarest book, and sell it—!

    Or, no, I wont do that.—For the thought of returning to Briar makes me shudder, even now; and it occurs to me in time that I have friends in London, after all. I have Mr Huss and Mr Hawtrey. Mr Huss—who liked to see me climb a staircase. Could I go to him, put myself in his power? I think I could, I am desperate enough . . . Mr Hawtrey, however, was kinder; and invited me to his house, to his shop on Holywell Street.—I think hell help me. I am sure he will. And I think Holywell Street ot be far— it? I do not know, and there are no maps here. But I shall find out the way. Mr Hawtrey will help me, then. Mr Hawtrey will help me find Sue . . .

    So my thoughts run, while the dawns of London break grubbily about me; while Mr Ibbs cooks bloaters, while his sister screams,

    while Gentleman coughs in his bed, while Mrs Sucksby turns in hers, and snores, and sighs.

    If only they would not keep me so close! One day, I think, each time a door is made fast at my back, one day theyll fet to lock it. Then Ill run. Theyll grow tired of always watg.—But, they do not. I plain of the thick, exhausted air. I plain of the mounti. I ask to go, oftehan I o the privy: for the privy lies at the other end of that dark and dusty passage at the back of the house, and shows me daylight. I know I could run from there to freedom, if I had the ce; but the ce does not e: Dainty walks there with me every time, and waits until I e out.—Once I do try to run, and she easily catches me and brings me back; and Mrs Sucksby hits her, for letting me go.

    Richard takes me upstairs, and hits me.

    Im sorry, he says, as he does it. But you know how hard we have worked for this. All you must do is wait, for the bringing of the lawyer. Yood at waiting, you told me once. Why wont you oblige us?

    The blow makes a bruise. Every day I see how it has lightehinking, Before that bruise quite fades, I will escape!

    I pass many hours in silence, brooding on this. I sit, i, in the shadows at the edge of lamp-light—Perhaps theyll fet me, I think. Sometimes it almost seems that they do: the stir of the house goes on, Dainty and John will kiss and quarrel, the babies will shriek, the men will play at cards and diow and then, other men will e—or boys, or else, more rarely, women and girls—with pluo be sold to Mr Ibbs and then sold on. They e, any hour of the day, with astonishing things—gross things, gaudy things—poor stuff, it seems to me, all of it: hats, handkerchiefs, cheap jewels, lengths of lace a hank of yellow hair still bound with a ribbon. A tumbling stream of things—not like the books that came to Briar, that came as if sinking to rest on the bed of a viscid sea, through dim and silent fathoms; nor like the things the books described, the things of veniend purpose—the chairs, the pillows, the beds, the curtains, the ropes, the rods . . .

    There are no books, here. There is only life in all its awful chaos. And the only purpose the things are made to serve, is the making of money.

    And the greatest money-making thing of all, is me.

    Not chilly, dear girl? Mrs Sucksby will say. Not peckish? Why, how warm your brow is! Not taking a fever, I hope? We t have you sick. I do not answer. I have heard it all before. I let her tuck rugs about me, I let her sit and chafe my fingers and cheek. Are you rather low? shell say. Just look at them lips. Theyd look handsome in a smile, they would. Not going to smile? Not even—she swal-lows—for me? Only glance, dear girl, at the almanack. She has scored through the days with crosses of black. Theres a month nearly gone by already, and only two more to e. Then we know what follows! That aint so long, is it?

    She says it, almost pleadingly; but I gaze steadily into her face— as if to say that a day, an hour, a sed, is too long, when passed with her.

    Oh, now! Her fingers ch about my hand; then sla, then pat. Still seems rather queer to you, does it, sweetheart? she says. Never mind. What  we get you, that will lift your spirits? Hey? A posy of flowers? A bow, for your pretty hair? A tri box? A singing bird, in a cage? Perhaps I make some movement. Aha! Wheres John? John, heres a shilling—its a bad one, so hand it over fast—nip out a Miss Lilly a bird in a cage.—Yellow bird, my dear, or blue?—No matter, John, so long as its pretty . . .

    She winks. John goes, aurns in half an hour with a fin a wicker basket. They fuss about that, then. They hang it from a beam, they shake it to make it flutter; Charley Wag, the dog, leaps and whines beh it. It will not sing, however—the room is too dark—it will only beat and pluck at its wings and bite the bars of its cage. At last they fet it. John takes to feeding it the blue heads of matches—he says he plans, in time, to make it swallow a long wick, and then to ig.

    Of Sue, no-one speaks at all. Once, Dainty looks at me as she puts out our suppers, and scratches her ear.

    Funny thing, she says, how Sue aint e back from the try, yet. Aint it?

    Mrs Sucksby gla Richard, at Mr Ibbs, and then at me. She wets her mouth. Look here, she says to Dainty, I havent wao talk about it, but you might as well know it, now. The truth is, Sue aint ing baot ever. That last little bit of busihat Gentlema her to see to had money in. More mohan was meant for her share. Shes up and cut, Dainty, with the cash.

    Daintys mouth falls open. No! Sue Trinder? What was like your own daughter?—Johnny! John chooses that moment to e down, for his supper. Johnny, you aint going to guess what! Sues took all of Mrs Sucksbys money, and thats why she aint e back. Done a flit. Just about broke Mrs Sucksbys heart. If we see her, we got to kill her.

    Done a flit? Sue Trinder? He snorts. She aint got the nerve.

    Well, she do.

    She do, says Mrs Sucksby, with anla me, and I dont want to hear her name said in this house. Thats all.

    Sue Triurned out a sharper! says John.

    Thats bad blood for you, says Richard. He also looks at me. Shows up in queer ways.

    What did I just say? says Mrs Sucksby hoarsely. I wont have her name said. She lifts her arm, and John falls silent. But he shakes his head and gives a whistle. Then after a moment, he laughs.

    More meat for us, though, aint it? he says, as he fills his plate. —Or would be, if it wasnt for the lady there.

    Mrs Sucksby sees him scowling at me; and leans and hits him.

    After that, if the men and women who e to the house ask after Sue, they are taken aside and told, like John and Dainty, that she has turned out wicked, double-crossed Mrs Sucksby and broken her heart. They all say the same: Sue Trinde藏书网r? Whod have thought her so fly? Thats the mother, that is, ing out in the child . . . They shake their heads, look sorry. But it seems to me, too, that they fet her quickly enough. It seems to me that even John and Dainty fet her. It is a short-memoried house, after all. It is a

    short-memoried district. Many times I wake in the night to the sound of footsteps, the creak of wheels—a man is running, a family taking flight, quietly, in darkness. The woman with the bandaged face, who nurses her baby oep of the house with the shutters with the heart-shaped holes, disappears; her place is taken by another—who, iurn, moves on, to be replaced by another, who drinks. Whats Sue, to them?

    Whats Sue, to me? Im afraid, here, to remember the pressing of her mouth, the sliding of her hand. But Im afraid, too, of fetting. I wish I could dream of her. I never do. Sometimes I take out the picture of the woman I supposed my mother, and look for her features there—her eyes, her pointed . Mrs Sucksby sees me do it. She watches, fretfully. Finally she takes the picture away.

    Dont you be thinking, she says, on things that are done and t be ged. All right, dear girl? You think of the time to e.

    She imagines I brood upon my past. But I am still brooding on my future. I am still watg keys as they are turned—soon one will be left in a lock, I know it. I am watg Dainty and John, Mr Ibbs— they are growing too used to me. Theyll turn careless, theyll fet. Soon, I think. Soon, Maud.

    So I think; until this happens.

    Richard takes to leaving the house each day, not saying where he is going. He has no money, and will have il the bringing of the lawyer: I think he goes only to walk the dusty streets, or to sit in the parks; I think the heat and the closeness of the Bh kit stifles him as much as it stifles me. One day, however, he goes, but returns in an hour. The house is quiet, for once: Mr Ibbs and Joh, and Dainty is sleeping in a chair. Mrs Sucksby lets him into the kit, ahrows off his hat and kisses her cheek. His face is flushed and his eyes are gleaming.

    Well, what do you think? he says.

    Dear boy, I t imagine! Have all your horses e up at once?

    Better than that, he says. He reaches for me. Maud? What do you think? e, out of the shadows. Dont look so fierce! Save that, till youve heard my news. It s you, rather.

    He has seized my chair and begun to haul me closer to the table. I shake him off. s me, how? I say, moodily. I have been sitting, thinking over the shape of my life.

    Youll see. Look here. He puts his hand to his waistcoat pocket and draws something out. A paper. He waves it.

    A bond, dear boy? says Mrs Sucksby, stepping to his side.

    A letter, he says, from—well, guess who? Will you guess, Maud? I say nothing. He pulls a face. Wont you play? Shall I give you a clue? It is someone you know. A friend, very dear.

    My heart gives a lurch. Sue! I say at once. But he jerks his head, and snorts.

    Not her. You think they give them paper, where she is? He gla Dainty; who opens and closes her eyes, and then sleeps on. Not her, he says again, more quietly. I mean, another friend of yours. You wont guess?

    I turn my face. Why should I? You mean to tell me, dont you?

    He waits another moment; then: Mr Lilly, he says. Your uhat was.—Aha! I have started. You are ied!

    Let me see, I say. Perhaps my uncle is searg for me, after all.

    Now, now. He holds the letter high. It has my name upon it, not yours.

    Let me see!

    I rise, pull down his arm, see a line of ink; then push him away.

    Thats not my uncles hand, I say—so disappointed, I could strike him.

    I never said it was, says Richard. The letters from him, but sent by another: his steward, Mr Way.

    Mr Way?

    More curious still, hmm? Well, you shall uand that, when you read it. Here. He unfolds the paper and hands it to me. Read this side, first. Its a postscript; and explains, at least—what Ive always thought so queer—why weve heard nothing from Briar, till now . . .

    The hand is cramped. The ink is smeared. I tilt the paper to catch what light I ; then read.

    Dear Sir.—I found today among my masters private papers, this letter, &amp; do suppose he meant it to be sent; only, he fell into a grave indisposition shortly after having wrote it, sir, whidisposition he tinues in to this day.—Mrs Stiles &amp; me did think at first, that this was through his niece having run off in such a sdalous mahough we beg leave to notice, sir, that his words herein suggest him not to have been overly astonished by that deed; as, begging leave again sir, no more were we.—We send this respectfully, sir, and presume to hope it finds you cheerful.—Mr Martin Way, Steward of Briar.

    I look up, but say nothing. Richard sees my expression and smiles. Read the rest, he says. I turn the paper over. The letter is short, and dated 3rd of May—seven weeks ago, now. It says this.

    To Mr Richard Rivers, from Christopher Lilly, Esq.—Sir. I suppose you have taken my niece, Maud Lilly. I wish you joy of her! Her mother was a strumpet, and she has all her mothers instincts, if not her face. The check to the progress of my work will be severe; but I take fort in my loss, from this: that I fancy you, sir, a man who knows the proper treating of a whore.—C.L.

    I read it, two or three times; then read it again; the fall. Mrs Sucksby instantly takes it up, to read herself. As she labours over the words, she grows flushed. When she has finished, she gives a cry:

    That blackguard! Oh!

    Her cry wakes Dainty. Who, Mrs Sucksby? Who? she says.

    A wicked man, thats all. A wicked man, who is ill, as he ought to be. No-one you know. Go back to sleep. She reaches for me. Oh, my dear—

    Leave me alone, I say.

    The letter has upset me, more than I should have believed. I

    dont know if it is the words that have wounded me most; or the final proof they seem to give, to Mrs Sucksbys story. But I ot bear to be watched by her, and by Richard, with my feelings in such a stir. I walk as far from them as I may—some two or three steps-— to the brown kit wall; then I walk from there to another wall and from there to a door; and I seize and vainly turn the handle.

    Let me out, I say.

    Mrs Sucksby es to me. She makes to reaot for the door, but for my face. I push her off—go quickly, to the sed door, and thehird.—Let me out! Let me out! She follows.

    Dear girl, she says, do yourself be upset by that old villain. Why, he aint worth your tears!

    Will you let me out?

    Let you out, to where? Aint everything here, that you need now? Aint everything here, or ing? Think of them jewels, them gowns—

    She has e close again. Again, I push her away. I step back to the gravy-coloured wall, and put my hand to it—a fist—a a it. Then I look up. Before my eyes is the almanack, its pages swarming with crosses of black. I catch hold of it, and pluck it from its pin. Dear girl— Mrs Sucksby says again. I turn and throw it at her.

    But afterwards, I fall weeping; and whe of tears has passed, I think I am ged. My spirit has gohe letter has taken it from me. The almanack goes back upon the wall, and I let it stay there. It grows steadily blacker, as we all inearer to our fates. The season advances. June grows warm, then even warmer. The house begins to be filled with flies. They drive Richard to a fury: he pursues them with a slipper, red-faced and sweating.—You know I am a gentlemans son? he will say. Would you think it, to look at me now? Would you?

    I do not answer. I have begun, like him, to long for the ing of Sues birthday in August. I will say anything they wish, I think, to any kind of solicitor or lawyer. But I pass my days in a sort of restless lethargy; and at night—for it is too hot to sleep—at night I

    d at the narrow window in Mrs Sucksbys room, gazing blankly

    at the street.

    Tome away from there, sweetheart, Mrs Sucksby will murmur f he wakes. They say there is cholera in the Bh. Who knows but you wont take a fever, from the draught?

    May oake a fever, from a draught of foetid air? I lie down at her side until she sleeps; then go back to the window, press my face to the gap between the sashes, breathe deeper.

    I almost fet that I mean to escape. Perhaps they se. For at last they leave me, oernoon—at the start of July, I think— with only Dainty to guard me.

    You watch her close, Mrs Sucksby tells her, drawing on gloves. Anything happen to her, Ill kill you. Me, she kisses. All right, my dear? I shant be gone an hour. Bring you back a present, shall I?

    I do not answer. Dainty lets her out, then pockets the key. She sits, draws a lamp across the table-top, and takes up work. Not washing napkins—for there are fewer babies, now: Mrs Sucksby has begun to find homes for them, and the house is daily growing stiller—but the pulling of silk stitches from stolen handkerchiefs. She does it listlessly, however. Dull work, she says, seeing me look. Sue used to do this. Care to try?

    I shake my head, let my eyelids fall; and presently, she yawns. I hear that; and am suddenly wide awake. If she will sleep, I think, I might try the doors—steal the key from her pocket! She yawns again. I begin to sweat. The clock ticks off the minutes—fifteen, twenty, twenty-five. Half an hour. I am dressed in the violet gown and white silk slippers. I have no hat, no money—never mind, never mind. Mr Hawtrey will give you that.

    Sleep, Dainty. Dainty, sleep. Sleep, sleep . . . Sleep, damn you!

    But she only yawns, and nods. The hour is almost up.

    Dainty, I say.

    She jumps. What is it?

    Im afraid— Im afraid I must visit the privy.

    She puts down her work, pulls a face. Must yht now, this minute?

    Yes. I place my hand on my stomach. I think I am sick.

    She rolls her eyes. Never knew a girl for siess, like you. Is th what they call a ladys stitution?

    I think it must be. Im sorry, Dainty. Will you open the door5

    Ill go with you, though.

    You . You might stay at your sewing, if you like ...&quot;

    Mrs Sucksby says I must go with you, every time; else Ill catch it. Here.

    She sighs, and stretches. The silk of her gown is stained beh the arms, the stain edged white. She takes out the key, unlocks the door, leads me into the passage. I go slowly, watg the lurg of her back. I remember having run from her before, and how she caught me: I know that, even if I might hit her aside now, she would only rise again at ond chase me. I might knock her head against the bricks . . . But I imagine doing it, and my wrists grow weak, I dont think I could.

    Go on, she says, when I hesitate. Why, whats up?

    Nothing. I catch hold of the privy door and draw it to me, slowly. You  wait, I say.

    No, Ill wait. She leans against the wall. Do me good, take the air.

    The air is warm and foul. In the privy it is warmer, and fouler. But I step inside and close the door and bolt it; then look about me. There is a little window, no bigger than my head, its broken paopped up with rag. There are spiders, and flies. The privy seat is cracked and smeared. I stand and think, perhaps for a minute. All right? calls Dainty. I do not ahe floor is earth, stamped hard. The walls are powdery white. From a wire hang strips of news-print. Ladies alemens Cast-off Clothing, in Good or Inferior dition, Wanted for— Welsh Mutton &amp; New-laid Eggs—

    Think, Maud.

    I turn to face the door, put my mouth to a gap in the wood.

    Dainty, I say quietly.

    What is it?

    Dainty, I am not well. You must fetch me something.

    What? She tries the door. e out, miss.

    I t. I darent. Dainty, you must go to the drawer, in the chest

    in my room upstairs. Will you? There is something there. Will

    you? Oh, I wish you would hurry! Oh, how it rushes! I am afraid of

    the men ing back—

    Oh,  she says, uandi last. She drops her voice. Caught you out has it?

    Will you go for me, Dainty? But Im not to leave you, miss!

    I must keep here, then, until Mrs Sucksby es! But say that John, or Mr Ibbs, should e first! Or say I swoon? And the door

    is bolted! What will Mrs Sucksby think of us, then? Oh Lord, she mutters. And then: In the chest of drawers, you

    say?

    The top-most drawer, on the right. Will you hurry? If I might

    ust make myself , and then lie down. I always take it so

    badly—

    All right.

    Be quick!

    All right!

    Her voice is fading. I press my ear to the wood, hear her feet, the opening and swinging back of the kit door.—I slide the bolt and run. I run out of the passage and into the court—I remember this, I remember the les, the bricks. Which way from here? There are high walls all about me. But I run further, and the walls give way. Theres a dusty path—it was slick with mud, when I came down it before; but I see it, and know it—I know it!—it leads to an alley and this, in turn, leads to another path, which crosses a street and leads me—where? To a road I do nhat runs uhe arches of a bridge. I recall the bridge, but remember it nearer, lower. I recall a high, dead wall. There is no wall here.

    No matter. Keep going. Keep the house at your back, and run. Take wider roads now: the lanes and alleys twist, and are dark, you must not get caught in them. Run, run. No matter that the sky seems vast and awful to you. No matter that London is loud. No matter that there are people here—no matter that they stare—no matter that their clothes are worn and faded, and yown bright;

    that their heads are covered, yours bare. No matter that your slippers are silk, that your feet are cut by every stone and der—

    So I whip myself along. Only the traffic checks me, the rushing horses and wheels: at every crossing I pause, then cast myself into the mass of cabs and waggons; and I think it is only my haste, my distra—that, and perhaps the vividness of my dress—that makes the drivers pull at their reins and keep from running me down. On, on, I go. I think once a dog barks at me, and snaps at my skirt. I think boys run beside me, for a time—two boys, or three— shrieking to see me stagger. You, I say, holding my hand against my side, will you tell me, where is Holywell Street? Which way, to Holywell Street?—but at the sound of my voice, they fall back.

    I go more slowly then. I cross a busier road. The buildings are grander here—awo streets beyond them the houses are shabby. Which way must I go? I will ask again, I will ask in a moment; for now, I will only walk, put streets and streets between myself and Mrs Sucksby, Richard, Mr Ibbs. What matter if I grow lost? I am lost already . . .

    Then I cross the mouth of a rising passage of yellow brid see at the end of it, dark and humped above the tips of broken roofs, its gold cross gleaming, the church of St Pauls. I know it, from illustrations; and I think Holywell Street is near it. I turn, pick up my skirts, make for it. The passage smells badly; but the church seems close. So close, it seems! The brick turns green, the smell grows worse. I climb, then suddenly sink, emerge in open air and almost stumble. I have expected a street, a square. Instead, I am at the top of a set of crooked stairs, leading down to filthy water. I have reached the shore of the river. St Pauls is close, after all; but the whole of the width of the Thames is flowiween us.

    I stand and gaze at it, in a sort of horror, a sort of awe. I remember walking beside the Thames, at Briar. I remember seeing it seem to fret and worry at its banks: I thought it longed—as I did—to qui, to spread. I did not know it would spread to this. It flows, like poison. Its surface is littered with broken matter—with hay, with wood, with weed, with paper, with tearings of cloth, with cork

    and tilting bottles. It moves, not as a river moves, but as a sea: it heaves. And where it breaks, against the hulls of boats, and where it is thrown, upon the shore, and about the stairs and the walls and woodehat rise from it, it froths like sour milk.

    It is an agony of water and of waste; but there are men upon it, fident as rats—pulling the oars of rowing-boats, tugging at sails. And here and there, at the rivers edge—bare-legged, bent-backed—are women, girls and boys, pig their way through the ing litter like gleaners in a field.

    They dont look up, and do not see me, though I stand for a minute and watch them wade. All along the shore I have e to, however, are warehouses, with w men about them; and presently, as I bee aware of them, they also spot me—spot my gown, I suppose—first stare, then signal and call. That jerks me out of my daze. I turn—go back along the yellow passage, take up the road again. I have seen the bridge that I must cross to reach St Pauls, but it seems to me that I am lower than I ought to be, and I ot find the road that will lead me up: the streets I am walking now are narrow, unpaved, still reeking of dirty water. There are men upooo—men of the boats and warehouses, who, like the others, try to catch my eye, whistle and sometimes call; though they do not touch me. I put my hand before my face, and go on faster. At last I find a boy, dressed like a servant. Which way is the bridge, I say, to the other shore? He points me out a flight of steps, and stares as I climb them.

    Everybody stares—men, women, children—even here, where the road is busy again, they stare. I think of tearing off a fold of skirt to cover my naked head. I think of begging a . If I knew what  to beg for, how much a hat would e, where it might be bought, I would do it. But I know nothing, nothing; and so simply walk on. The soles of my slippers I think are beginning to tear. Dont mind it, Maud. If you start to mind it, you will weep. Then the road ahead of me begins to rise, and I see again the gleam of water. The bridge, at last!—that makes me walk quicker. But walking quicker makes the slippers tear more; and after a moment, I am obliged to stop. There is a break in the wall at the start of the bridge

    with, set into it, a shallow stone bench. Hung up beside it is a belt of eant for throwing, it says upon a sign, to those in difficulties upon the river.

    I sit. The bridge is higher than I imagi. I have never been so high! The thought makes me dizzy. I touch my broken shoe. May a woman nurse her foot on a public bridge? I do not know. The traffic passes, swift and unbroken, like r water. Suppose Richard should e? Again, I cover my face. A moment, and Ill go on. The sun is hot. A moment, to find my breath. I y eyes. Now, when people stare, I ot see them.

    Then someone es and stands before me, and speaks. Im afraid youre unwell.

    I open my eyes. A man, rather aged. A strao me. I let my hand fall.

    Dont be afraid, he says. Perhaps I look bewildered. I dido surprise you.

    He touches his hat, makes a sort of bow. He might be a friend of

    my uncles. His voice is a gentlemans voice, and his collar is white.

    He smiles, then studies me closer. His face is kind. Are you unwell?

    Will you help me? I say. He hears my void his look

    ges.

    Of course, he says. What is it? Are you hurt? Not hurt, I say. But I have been made to suffer dreadfully. I— I cast a look at the coaches and waggons upon the bridge. Im afraid, I say, of certain people. Will you help me? Oh, I wish you would say you will!

    I have said it, already. But, this is extraordinary! And you, a lady— Will you e with me? You must tell me all your story; I shall hear it all. Dont try to speak, just yet.  you rise? Im afraid youre injured about the feet. Dear, dear! Let me look for a cab. Thats right.

    He gives me his arm, and I take it and stand. Relief has made me weak. Thank God! I say. Oh, thank God! But, listen to me. I grip him harder. I have nothing—no moo pay you with—

    Money? He puts his hand over mine. I should not take it. Dont think of it!

    —But I  have a friend, who I think will help me. If youll take me

    to him?

    Of course, of course. What else? e, look, heres what we need. He leans into the road, raises his arm: a cab pulls out of the stream of traffid halts before us. The gentleman seizes the door and draws it back. The cab is covered, and dark. Take care, he says.  you maake care. The step is rather high.

    Thank God! I say again, lifting my foot. He es behind me

    as I do it.

    Thats right, he says. And then: Why look, how prettily you

    climb!

    I stop, with my foot upoep. He puts his hand upon my waist. Go on, he says, urgio the coach.

    I step back.

    After all, I say quickly, I think I should walk. Will you tell me the way?

    The day is too hot to walk. You are too weary. Go on.

    His hand is upoill. He presses harder. I twist away and we almost struggle.

    Now, then! he says, smiling.

    I have ged my mind.

    e, now.

    Let go of me.   i

    Do you wish to cause a fuss? e, now. I know a house—

    A house? Havent I told you that I want only to see my friend?

    Well, hell like you better, I think, when you have washed your hands and ged your stogs and taken a tea. Or else—who knows?—when you have dohose things you may find you like me better.—Hmm?

    His face is still kind, he still smiles; but he takes my wrist and moves his thumb across it, and tries, again, to hao the coach. We struggle properly, now. No-ories to intervene. From the other vehicles in the road I suppose we are quite hidden. The men and women passing upon the bridge look ohen turn their heads.

    There is the driver, however. I call to him. t you see? I call.

    Theres been a mistake here. This man is insultihe mas me go, then. I move further about the coach, still calling up. Will you take me? Will you take me, alone? I shall find someoo pay you, I give you my word, when we arrive.

    The driver looks me over blankly as I speak. When he learns I have no money, he turns his head and spits. No fare, no passage, he says.

    The man has e close again. e on, he says—not smiling, now. Theres no need for this. What are you playing at? Its clear youre in some sort of fix. Shouldnt you like the stogs, the tea?

    But I still call up to the driver. Will you tell me, then, I say, which way I must walk? I must reach Holywell Street. Will you tell me, which way I must take, for there?

    He hears the name and snorts—in s, or laughter, I ot tell. But he raises his whip. That way/ he says, gesturing over the bridge; thewards, by Fleet Street.

    Thank you. I begin to walk. The man reaches for me. Let go of me, I say.

    You dont mean it. Let go!

    I almost shriek it. He falls back. Go on, then! he says. You damn little teaser.

    I walk, as quickly as I . I almost run. But then, after a moment, the cab es beside me and slows to match my pace. The gentleman looks out. His face has ged again.

    Im sorry, he says, coaxingly. e up. Im sorry. Will you e? Ill take you to your friend, I swear it. Look here. Look here. He shows me a . Ill give you this. e up. You mustnt go to Holywell Street, they are bad men there—not at all like me. e now, I know youre a lady. e, Ill be kind ...&quot;

    So he calls and murmurs, half the length of the bridge; until finally a line of waggons forms behind the crawling cab, and the driver shouts that he must go on. Then the man draws back, puts up his window with a bang; the cab pulls away. I let out my breath. I have begun to shake. I should like to stop, to rest; I dare not, now.

    T leave the bridge: here the road meets another, more busy than those on the southern shore; but more anonymous too, I think. I am grateful for that, though the crowds—the crowds are terrible. Never mind, never mind, push through them. Go owards, as the driver directed.

    Now the street ges again. It is lined with houses with bulging windows—shops, I uand them to be, at last: for there are goods on show, marked up with prices on cards. There are breads, there are medies. There are gloves. There are shoes and hats.—Oh, for a little money! I think of the  the gentleman offered, from the window of the coach: should I have seized it, and run? Too late to wo now. No matter. Go on. Here is a church, parting the road like the n of a bridge parts water. Which side ought I to take? A asses, bare-headed like me: I catch her arm, ask her the way. She points it out and then, like everyone else, stands staring as I take it.

    But here is Holywell Street at last!—Only, now I hesitate. How have I imagi? Not like this, perhaps—not so narrow, so crooked, so dark. The London day is still hot, still bright; in turning into Holywell Street, however, I seem to step into twilight. But the twilight is good, after all: it hides my face, and robs my gown of its colours. I walk further. The way grows narrower. The ground is dusty, broken, uhere are shops, lit up, oher side of me: some with lines of tattered clothes hung before them, some with broken chairs ay picture-frames and classes spilling from them, in heaps; the most, however, selling books. I hesitate again, when I see that. I have not handled a book since I left Briar; and now, to e so suddenly upon them, in suumbers; to see them laid, face-up, like loaves in trays, or piled, haphazardly, in baskets; to see them torn, and foxed, and bleached—marked up 2d., 3d., This Box Is.—quite unnerves me. I stop, and watch as a man picks idly through a box of coverless volumes and takes one up. The Mousetrap of Love.—I know it, I have read that title so many times to my uncle I know it almost by heart!

    Then the man lifts his head and finds me watg; and I walk on. More shops, more books, more men; and finally a window, a

    little brighter than the rest. The display is of prints, hung up on strings. The glass has Mr Hawtreys name upon it, iers of flaking gold. I see it, and shake so hard I almost stumble.

    Ihe shop is small and cramped. I have not expected that. The walls are all giveo books and prints, and there are ets, besides. Three or four men stand at them, each leafing rapidly and ily through some album or book: they dont look up when the door is opened; but when I take a step and my skirts give a rustle, they all turn their heads, see me, and openly stare. But I am used to stares, by now. At the rear of the shop is a little writing-table, with a youth sitting at it, dressed in a waistcoat and sleeves. He stares, as they do—then, when he sees me advang, gets up. What are you looking for? he says. I swallow. My mouth is dry.

    I say, quietly, Im looking for Mr Hawtrey. I wish to speak with Mr Hawtrey.

    He hears my voice, and blinks; the ers shift a little, and look me ain. Mr Hawtrey, he says, his tone a little ged. Mr Hawtrey doesnt work in the shop. You oughtnt to have e to the shop. Have you got an appoi?

    Mr Hawtrey knows me, I say. I dont need an appoi. He gla the ers. He says, Whats your business with him?

    Its private, I say. Will you take me to him? Will y him to me?

    There must be something to my look, however, or my voice. He grows muarded, steps back.

    Im not sure, after all, if hes in, he says. Really, you oughtnt to have e to the shop. The shop is for selling books and prints—do you know what kind? Mr Hawtreys rooms are upstairs.

    Theres a door, at his back. Will you let me go to him? I say. He shakes his head. You may send up a card, something like that.

    I dont have a card, I say. But give me a paper, and Ill write him out my name. Hell e, when he reads it. Will you give me a paper?

    fie does not move. He says again, I dont believe hes in the

    house.

    Then Ill wait, if I must, I say.

    You ot wait here!

    Then I think, I answer, you must have an office, some room like that; and I will wait there.

    He looks again at the ers; picks up a pencil and puts it

    down.

    If you will? I say.

    He makes a face. Then he finds me a slip of paper and a pen. But you shant, he says, be able to wait, if it turns out hes not in.1 I nod. Put your name on there, he says, pointing.

    I begin to write. Then I remember what Richard told me once— how the booksellers speak of me, in the shops of London. I am afraid to write, Maud Lilly. I am afraid the youth will see. At last— remembering something else—I put this: Galatea.

    I fold it, and hand it to him. He opens the door, whistles into the passage beyond. He listens, then whistles again. There e footsteps. He leans and murmurs, gestures to me. I wait.

    And, as I do, one of the ers closes his album and catches my eye. Dont mind him, he says softly, meaning the youth. He supposes you gay, thats all. Anyone  see, though, that youre a lady . . . He looks me over, then nods to the shelves of books. You like them, hmm? he says, in a different tone. Of course you do. Why shouldnt you?

    I say nothing, do nothing. The youth steps back.

    Were seeing, he says, if hes in.

    There are pictures behind his head, pio the wall in aper ers: a girl on a swing, showing her legs; a girl in a boat, about to slip; a girl falling, falling from the breaking branch of a tree ... I y eyes. He calls to one of the men: Do you wish to buy that book, sir—?

    Presently, however, there ore footsteps, and the door is opened again.

    It is Mr Hawtrey.

    He looks shorter, and slighter, than I remember him. His coat

    and trousers are creased. He stands in the passage in some agitation, does not e into the shop—meets my gaze, but does not smile— looks about me, as if to be sure I am alohen bee to him. The youth steps back to let me pass. Mr Hawtrey— I say. He shakes his head, however; waits until the door is closed behind me before he will speak. What he says then—in a whisper so fierce it is almost a hiss—is:

    Good God! Is it you? Have you really e here, to me?

    I say nothing, only stand with my eyes on his. He puts his hand, in distra, to his head. Theakes my arm. This way, he says, leadio a set of stairs. The steps have boxes upon them. Be careful. Be careful, he says, as we climb them. And then, at the top: In here.

    There are three rooms, set up for the printing and binding of books. Iwo men work, loading type; another, I think, is Mr Hawtreys own office. The third is small, and smells strongly of glue. Its ihat he shows me. The tables are piled with papers—loose papers, ragged at the edges: the leaves of unfinished books. The floor is bare and dusty. One wall—the wall to the typesetters room—has frosted glass panels in it. The men are just visible, bending over their work.

    There is a single chair, but he does not ask me to sit. He closes the door and stands before it. He takes out a handkerchief and wipes his face. His face is yellowish-white.

    Good God, he says again. And then: Five me. Five me. Its only the surprise of the thing.

    He says it, more kindly; and I hear him and half turn away.

    Im sorry, I say. My voice is not steady. Im afraid I will weep. I have not e to you to weep.

    You may weep, if you like! he says, with a gla the frosted glass.

    But I will not weep. He watches me struggling against my tears for a moment, then shakes his head.

    My dear, he says gently at last. What have you done?

    Dont ask me.

    You have run away.

    From my uncle, yes.

    From your husband, I think.

    My husband? I swallow. Do you know, then, of that?

    He shrugs, colours, looks away.

    I say, You think me wrong. You do not know what I have been made to suffer! Dont worry—for he has lifted his eyes to glance, again, at the panels of glass—dont worry, I shant grow wild. You may think what you like of me, I dont care. But you must help me.

    Will you?

    My dear—

    You will. You must. I have nothing. I need money, a house to stay in. You used to like to say you would make me wele—

    Despite myself, my voice is rising.

    Be calmer, he says—lifting his hands as if to soothe me; but not moving from his place at the door. Be calmer. You know how queer this will look? Do you? What are my staff to think? A girl es asking for me urgently, sending up a riddling name . . . He laughs, not happily. What would my daughters say, my wife?

    I am sorry.

    Again he wipes his face. He lets out his breath. I wish you would tell me, he says, why you have e, to me. You mustnt think I will take your part against your uncle. I never liked to see him keep you so meanly, but he mustnt know youve e here. Nor must you think—is it what you are hoping?—that Ill help you bato his favours. He has quite cast you off, you know. Besides that, he is ill—seriously ill—over this business. Did you know that?

    I shake my head. My uncle is nothing to me, now.

    But he is something to me, you uand. If he should hear of your ing—

    He will not.

    Well. He sighs. Then his face grows troubled again. But to e to me! To e here! And he looks me over, takes in my gaudy dress and gloves—which are filthy; my hair—which I think is tangled; my face—which must be dusty, lustreless, white. I should hardly have known you, he says, still frowning, you seem so ged. Where is your coat, and your hat?

    There was not time—

    He looks appalled. Did you e, like this? He squints at the hem of my skirt; then he sees my feet, and starts. Why, look at your slippers! Your feet are bleeding! Did you leave, without shoes?

    I must. I have nothing!

    Not shoes?

    No. Not so much as that.

    Rivers keeps you without shoes?

    He does not believe it. If I might only, I say, make you know— But he is not listening. He is looking about him, as if seeing for the first time the tables, the piles of paper. He takes up a few blank sheets, begins hurriedly to cover up the naked print.

    You oughtnt to have e here, he says, as he does it. Look at this! Look at this!

    I catch sight of a line of print. —you shall have enough, I warrant you, and I shall whip, whip— Do you try and hide it, I say, from me? I have seen worse at Briar. Have you fotten?

    This is not Briar. You dont uand. How could you? You were amolemen, there. It is Rivers I blame for this. He ought—having taken you—at least to have kept you closer. He saw what you were.

    You dont know, I say. You dont know how hes used me!

    I dont want to know! It is not my place to know! Dont tell me.—Oh, only look at yourself! Do you know how you will have seemed, uporeets? You t have e unnoticed, surely?

    I gaze down at my skirt, my slippers. There was a man, I say, upon the bridge. I thought he meant to help me. But he meant only— My voice begins to shake.

    You see? he says then. You see? Suppose a poli should have seen you, and followed you here? Do you know what would happen to me—to my staff, to my stock—if the police were to e down heavily upon us? They might, for such a matter as this.—Oh, God, only look at your feet! Are they bleeding, truly?

    He helps me into the chair, then gazes about him. Theres a sink, he says,  door. Wait here, will you? He goes off, to the room with the typesetters in it. I see them lift their heads, hear his

    nice.—I dont know what he must tell them. I dont care. In sitting, I have grown tired; and the soles of my feet, whitil now have been almost numb, have begun to smart. The room has no window of its own, and no ey, and the smell of glue seems stronger. I have e close to one of the tables: I lean upon it, and gaze across it—at the piles of pages, untrimmed, unsewn, some of them disturbed or cealed by Mr Hawtrey.—and I shall whip, whip, whip, your backside till the blood runs down your heels— The print is new, and black; but the paper is poor, the ink has feathered. What is the fount? I know it, but—it troubles me—I ot .

    —so, so, so, so, so, you like the birch, do you?

    Mr Hawtrey returns. He has a cloth, and a bowl, half-filled with water; also a glass, with water for me to drink.

    Here you are, he says, putting the bowl before me, wetting the cloth and handing it to me; then glang nervously away.  you do it? Just enough to take the blood away, for now

    The water is cold. When I have wiped my feet I wet the cloth again and, for a sed, sit and hold it to my face. Mr Hawtrey looks round and sees me do it. Youre not feverish? he says. Youre not ill?—I am only warm, I say. He nods, and es and takes the bowl. Then he gives me the glass, and I drink a little of it. Very good, he says.

    I look again at the leaves of print upoable; but the name of the fount escapes me, still. Mr Hawtrey checks his watch. Thes his hand to his mouth and bites at the skin of his thumb, and frowns.

    I say, Yood, to help me. I think other men would blame me.

    No, no. Havent I said? It is Rivers I blame. Never mind. Tell me, now. Be ho with me. What money have you, upon you now?

    I have none.

    No mo<samp>藏书网</samp> all?

    I have only this gown. But we might sell it, I think? I should sooake a plainer one, anyway.

    Sell yown? His frown grows deeper. Dont speak so oddly, will you? When you go back—

    Go back? To Briar?

    To Briar? I mean, to your husband.

    To him? I look at him in amazement. I ot go ba! It has takewo months to escape him!

    He shakes his head. Mrs Rivers— he says. I shudder.

    Dont call me that, I say, I beg you.

    Again, so odd! What ought I to call you, if not that?

    Call me Maud. You asked me, just now, what I have that is mine. I have that hat, and nothing else.

    He makes some movement with his hand. Dont be foolish, he says. Listen to me, now. I am sorry for you. You have had some quarrel, havent you—?

    I laugh—so sharply, he starts; and the two typesetters look up. He sees them do it, then turns bae.

    Will you be reasonable? he says quietly, warningly.

    But how  I be that?

    A quarrel, I say. You think it a quarrel. You think I have run on bleedi, half-way across London, for that? You know nothing. You ot guess what danger I am in, what coils—! But, I t tell you. Its too great a thing.

    What is?

    A secret thing. A scheme. I ot say. I ot— Oh! I have lowered my gaze, and it has fallen again upon the pages of print. you like the birch, do you? What is this type? I say. Will you tell me?

    He swallows. This type? he says, his voice quite ged.

    This fount.

    For a sed he does not ahen: Clarendon, he says, quietly.

    Clarendon. Clarendon. I k, after all. I tio gaze at the paper—I think I put my fio the print—until Mr Hawtrey es and places a blank sheet upon it, as he did with the others.

    Dont look there, he says. Dont stare so! What is the matter with you? I think you must be ill.

    I am not ill, I answer. I am only tired. I y eyes. I wish I might stay here, and sleep.

    Stay here? he says. Stay here, in my shop? Are you mad? At sound of that word I open my eyes, a his gaze; he colours, looks quickly away. I say again, more steadily, I am only tired. But he does not answer. He puts his hand to his mouth and begins to bite, again, at the skin of his thumb; aches me, carefully, cautiously, from the side of his eye. Mr Hawtrey— I

    say.

    I wish, he says suddenly then, I just wish you would tell me what it is you mean to do. How am I even to get you from the shop? I must bring a cab, I suppose, to the back of the building.

    Will you do that?

    You have somewhere to go, to sleep? To eat?

    I have nowhere!

    You must go home, then.

    I ot do that. I have no home! I need only a little money, a little time. There is a person I mean to find, to save—

    To save?

    To find. To find. And, having fouhen I may need help again. Only a little help. I have beeed, Mr Hawtrey. I have been wronged. I think, with a lawyer—if we might find an ho man— You know I am rich?—or, ought to be. Agaiches but does not speak. I say, You know I am rich. If youll only help me, now. If youll only keep me—

    Keep you! Do you know what you are saying? Keep you, where?

    Not in your own house?

    My house?

    I thought—

    My house? With my wife and daughters? No, no. He has begun to pace.

    But at Briar you said, many times—

    Havent I told you? This is not Briar. The world is not like Briar. You must find that out. How old are you? You are a child. You ot leave a husband, as you may leave an uncle. You ot live, in London, on nothing. How do you think you will live?

    I do not know. I supposed— I supposed you would give me money,

    I want to say. I look about me. Then I am struck with an idea. Might I not, I say, work for you?

    He stands still. For me?

    Might I not work here? Iting together of books?—the writing, even? I know that work. You knoell I know it! You may pay me a wage. I shall take a room—I need only one room, one quiet room!—I shall take it secretly, Richard shall never know, you shall keep my secret for me. I shall work, and earn a little money— enough to find out my friend, to find out an ho lawyer; and then—What is it?

    He has kept still, all this time; but his look has ged, is odd.

    Nothing, he says, moving. I— Nothing. Drink your water.

    I suppose I am flushed. I have spoken rapidly, and grown warm: I swallow, ahe chill dest of the water inside my breast, like a sword. He moves to the table and leans upon it, not looking at me, but thinking, thinking. When I set down the glass he turns back. He does not catch my eye.

    Listen to me, he says. He speaks quietly. You ot stay here, you know that. I must send for a cab, to take you. I— I must send for some woman, also. I will pay for a woman to go with you.

    Go with me, where?

    To some—hotel. Now he has turned again, has taken up a pen—looks in a book, begins to set down a dire upon a slip of paper. Some house, he says, as he does it, where you may rest and take a supper.

    Where I may rest? I say. I dont think I shall rest, ever again! But a room! A room!—And will you e to me there? Tonight? He does not answer. Mr Hawtrey?

    Not tonight, he says, still writing. Tonight I ot.

    Tomorrow, then.

    He waves the paper, to dry it; then folds it. Tomorrow, he says. If I .

    You must!

    Yes, yes.

    And the work—my w for you. Youll sider that? Say you will!

    Hush. Yes, Ill sider it. Yes.

    Thank God!

    I put my hand before my eyes. Stay here, he says. Will you? Dont go from here.

    I hear him step, then, to the room  door; and when I look, I see him speaking quietly to one of the typesetters—see the man draw on his jacket, then go. Mr Hawtrey es back. He nods to my feet.

    Put your shoes on, now, he says, turning away. We must be

    ready

    You are kind, Mr Hawtrey, I say, as I lean to tug on my broken slippers. God knows, no-one has been so kind to me, since— My voice is lost.

    There, there, he says, distractedly. Dont think of it, now . . .

    Then I sit in silence. He waits, takes out his watch, goes now and then to the top of the stairs, to stand and listen. At last he goes and es quickly back.

    They are here, he says. Now, have you everything? e this way, carefully.

    He takes me dowakes me through a set of rooms, piled high with crates and boxes, and then through a sort of scullery, to a door. The door leads to a little grey area: there are steps from this, to an alley. A cab waits there with, beside it, a woman. She sees us and nods.

    You know what to do? Mr Hawtrey says to her. She nods again. He gives her money, ed in the paper on which he has written. Here is the lady, look. Her name is Mrs Rivers. You are to be kind to her. Have you some shawl?

    She has a plaid wool , which she puts about me, to cover up my head. The wool is hot against my cheek. The day is still warm, though it is almost twilight. The sun has gone from the sky. I have been three hours from Lant Street.

    At the door to the cab, I turn. I take Mr Hawtreys hand.

    You will e, I say, tomorrow?

    Of course.

    You wont talk of this, to anyone? Youll remember the danger I spoke of?

    He nods. Go on, he says quietly. This woman will care for you now, better than I.  ?

    Thank you, Mr Hawtrey!

    He hands me into the cab—hesitates, before lifting my fio his mouth. The woman es . He closes the door at her back, then moves off, out of the path of the turning wheel. I lean to the glass and see him take out his handkerchief, wipe his fad neck; theurn, pull out of the alley, and he is gone. We drive away from Holywell Street—northwards, so far as I  tell; for I know— I am almost certain—that we do not cross the river.

    We go very fitfully, however. The traffic is thick. I keep with my face at the window at first, watg the crowds uporeets, the shops. Then I think, Suppose I see Richard?—and I fall back against the leather seat and study the streets from there.

    Only after some time of this do I look again at the woman. She has her hands in her lap: they are gloveless, and coarse. She catches my eye.

    All right, dearie? she says, not smiling. Her voice is rough as her fingers.

    Do I begin, then, to feel wary? I am not sure. I think, After all, Mr Hawtrey had not the time to be careful, in his finding of a woman. What matter if shes not kind, so long as shes ho? I look more closely at her. Her skirt is a rusty black. Her shoes are the colour aure of roasted meat. She sits placidly, not speaking, while the cab shudders and jolts.

    Must we go far? I ask her at last.

    Not too far, dearie.

    Her voice is still rough, her face without expression. I say, fretfully, Do you call me that? I wish you wouldnt.

    She shrugs. The gesture is so bold a so careless, I think I do then grow uneasy. I put my face again to the window, to try to draw in air. The air will not e. Where is Holywell Street, I think, from here?

    I dont like this, I say, turning back to the woman. May we not walk?

    Walk, in them slippers? She snorts. She looks out. Heres

    Camden Town, she says. Weve a fair way, yet. Sit bad be

    good.

    Will you talk to me, so? I say again. I am not a child.

    And again, she shrugs. We drive on, more smoothly. We drive for perhaps, half an hour, up a rising road. The day is darker now. I am tenser. We have left the lights and shops, and are in some street—some street of plain buildings. We turn a er, and the buildings grow plaiill. Presently we draw up before a great, grey house. There is a lamp, at the foot of its steps. A girl in a ragged apron is reag with a taper to light it. The glass of its shade is cracked. The street is perfectly silent.

    Whats this? I say to the woman, when the coach has stopped and I uand it will not go on.

    Heres your house, she says.

    The hotel?

    Hotel? She smiles. You may call it that. She reaches for the lat the door. I put my hand on her wrist.

    Wait, I say—feeling real fear now, at last. What do you mean? Where has Mr Hawtrey directed you to?

    Why, to here!

    And what is here?

    Its a house, aint it? What is it to you, what sort? You shall get your supper all the same.—You might leave off gripping me, mind!

    Not until you tell me where I am.

    She tries to pull her hand away, but I will not let her. Finally, she sucks her teeth.

    House for ladies, she says, like you.

    Like me?

    Like you. Poor ladies, widow ladies—wicked ladies, I shouldnt wohere!

    I have thrust her wrist aside.

    I dont believe you, I say. I am meant to e to an hotel. Mr Hawtrey paid you for that—

    Paid me t you here, and then to leave you. Most particular. If you dont like it— She reaches into her pocket. Why, heres his very hand.

    She has brought out a piece of paper. It is the paper that Mr Hawtrey put about the . It has the name of the house upon it__

    A home, he calls it, for destitute gentlewomen. For a moment I gaze at the words in a sort of disbelief: as if my gazing at them will ge them, ge their meaning or shape. Then I look at the woman. This is a mistake, I say. He didnt mean

    this. He has misuood, or you have. You must take me back__

    Im t you, and leave you, most particular, she says stubbornly again. &quot;Poor lady, weak in her head, aking to a charity place.&quot; Theres charity, aint it?

    She nods again to the house. I do not answer. I am remembering Mr Hawtreys look—his words, the odd tone of his voice. I think, / must go back! I must go back to Holywell Street!—a, even as I think it, I know, with a dreadful chill tra of my heart, what I will find there if I do: the shop, the men, the youth; and Mr Hawtrey goo his own home—his home, which might be anywhere iy, anywhere at all... And after that, the street—the street in darkness.—How shall I ma? How shall I live a night, in London, on my own?

    I begin to shake. What am I to do? I say.

    What, but go over, says the woman, nodding again to the house. The girl with the taper is gone, and the lamp burns feebly. The windows are shuttered, the glass above them black, as if the rooms are filled with darkness. The door is high—divided in two, like the great front door at Briar. I see it, and am gripped by panic.

    I ot, I say. I ot!

    Again the woman sucks her teeth. Better that than the road— aint it? Its one or the other. I am paid t you here and leave you, thats all. Go on out, now, a me get home.

    I ot, I say again. I grab at her sleeve. You must take me, somewhere else.

    Must I? She laughs—does not shake me off, however. Instead, her look ges. Well, I will, she says; if youll pay me.

    Pay you? I have nothing to pay you with!

    She laughs again. No money? she says. And a dress like that?

    She looks at my skirt.

    Oh, God, I say, plug at it in desperation. I would give you the gown, if I might!

    Would you?

    Take the shawl!

    The shawls my own! She snorts. She still looks at my skirt. Theilts her head. What you got, she says more quietly, underh?

    I shudder. Then slowly, shrinkingly, I draw up my hem, show her my petticoats—two petticoats there are, one white and one crimson. She sees them, and nods.

    Theyll do. Silk, are they? Theyll do.

    What, both? I say. Will you take both?

    Theres the driver needs his fare, aint there? she answers. You must pay me, onyself; and once for him.

    I hesitate—but what  I do? I lift my skirt higher, find out the strings at my waist and pull them loose; then, modestly as I , draw the petticoats down. She does not look away. She takes them from me and tucks them swiftly under her coat.

    What the gentleman dont know, eh? she says, with a chuckle; as if we are close spirators now. She rubs her hands. Where to, then? Eh? Where must I tell the driver?

    She has opehe window, to call. I sit with my arms about myself, feeling the prickle of the fabriy gown against my bare thighs. I think I would colour, I think I would weep, if I had life enough.

    Where to? she asks again. Beyond her head, the street is filled with shadow. A moon has risen—a crest, slender, filthy-brown.

    I bow my head. With this last, awful bafflement of my hopes, I have only one place to go. I tell her, she calls it, and the coach starts up. She settles herself more fortably in her seat, rearranges her coat. She looks at me.

    All right, dearie? she says. I do not answer, and she laughs. She turns away. Dont mind it now, does she? she says, as if to herself. Dont mind it, now.

    Lant Street is dark when we reach it. I know the house to stop at,

    from the house which faces it—the oh the oi-coloured shutters, that I have gazed at so hard from Mrs Sucksbys window John answers my knock. His face is white. He sees me, and stares Fuck, he says. I go past him. The door leads into what I suppose is Mr Ibbss shop, and a passage from that takes me directly into the kit. They are all there, apart from Richard. He is out in seare. Dainty is weeping: her cheek is bruised, worse than before, her lip split and bleeding. Mr Ibbs paces in his shirt-sleeves, making the floorboards jump and creak. Mrs Sucksby stands, her eyes on nothing, her face white as powder, like Johns. She stands still. But when she sees me e she folds and winces—puts her hand to her heart as if struck.

    Oh, my girl, she says.

    I dont know what they do after that. Dainty screams, I think. I go by them, not looking. I go up the stairs to Mrs Sucksbys room— my room, our room, I suppose I must call it now—and I sit upon the bed, my face to the window. I sit with my hands in my lap, my head bowed. My fingers are marked with dirt. My feet have begun, again, to bleed.

    She gives me a minute, before she es. She es quietly. She closes the door and locks it at her back—turning the key gently in the lock, as if she thinks me sleeping and fears to wake me. Theands at my side. She does not try to touch me. I know, however, that she is trembling.

    Dear girl, she says. We supposed you lost. We supposed you drowned, or murdered—

    Her voice catches, but does not break. She waits and, when I do nothing, Stand up, sweetheart, she says.

    I do. She takes the gown from me, and the stays. She does not ask what has bee of my petticoats. She does not exclaim over my slippers ahough she shudders, as she draws off my stogs. She puts me, naked, into the bed; draws up the blao my jaw; then sits beside me. She strokes my hair—teases out the pins and tangles with her hands. My head is loose, and jerks as she tugs. There, now, she says.

    The house is silent. I think Mr Ibbs and Johalking, but

    talking in whispers. Her fingers move more slowly. There, now, she ays again; and I shiver, for her voice is Sues.

    Her voice is Sues, but her face— The room is dark, however, she has nht a dle. She sits with her back to the window. But I feel her gaze, and her breath. I y eyes.

    We thought you lost, she murmurs again. But you came back. Dear girl, I knew you should!

    I have nowhere else, I answer, slowly and hopelessly. I have nowhere and no-one. I thought I k; I never k till now. I have nothing. No home—

    Here is your home! she says.

    No friends—

    Here are your friends!

    No love—

    She draws in her breath; then speaks, in a whisper.

    Dear girl, dont you know? Aint I said, a huimes—?

    I begin to weep—in frustration, exhaustion. Why will you say it? I cry, through my tears. Why will you? Isnt it enough, to have got me here? Why must you also love me? Why must you smother and torment me, with yrasping after my heart?

    I have raised myself up; but the cry takes the last of my strength and soon, I fall back. She does not speak. She watches. She waits, until I have grown still. Theurns her head and tilts it. I think, from the curve of her cheek, that she is smiling.

    How quiet the house is, she says, now so many infants are gone! Aint it? She turns bae. I hear her swallow. Did I tell you, dear girl, she says softly, that I once bore an infant of my own, that died? Round about the time that that lady, Sues mother, came? She nods. So I said. So youll hear it told, round here, if you ask. Babies do die. Whod think that queer . . .?

    There is something to her voice. I begin to shake. She feels it, and reaches again to stroke my tangled head. There, now. Hush, now. You are quite safe, now . . . Theroking stops. She has caught up a lock of hair. She smiles again. Funny thing, she says, in a different tone, about your hair. Your eye I did suppose brown, and your colour white, and your waist and hands I knew would be

    slender. Only your hair e out rather fairer than I had it pictured

    The words drop away. In reag, she has moved her head: the light from the street-lamp, and from the sliver of tarnished moon, falls full upon her, and all at once I see her face—the brown of her own eye, and her own pale cheek—and her lip, that is plump and must, I uand suddenly, must once have been plumper . . . She wets her mouth. Dear girl, she says. My own, my own dear girl—

    She hesitates another moment; then speaks, at last.

 Part Three Chapter Fourteen

    I shrieked. I shrieked and shrieked. I struggled like a fiend. But the more I twisted, the tighter I was held. I saw Gentleman fall ba his seat and the coach start up and begin to turn. I saut her face to the window of cloudy glass. At sight of her eyes, I shrieked again.

    There she is! I cried, lifting my hand and pointing. There she is! Do her go! Dont you fug let her go—!

    But the coach drove on, the wheels throwing up dust and gravel as the hot up its speed; and the faster it went, the harder I think I fought. Now the other doctor came forward, to help Dr Christie. The woman in the apron came, too. They were trying to pull me closer to the house. I wouldhem. The coach eeding, growing smaller. Theyre getting away! I cried. Then the woman got behind me and seized my waist. She had a grip on her like a mans. She lifted me up the two or three steps that led to the houses front door, as if I might be so mahers in a bag.

    Now then, she said as she hauled me. Whats this? Kick ys, will you, and trouble the doctors?

    Her mouth was close to my ear, her face behind me. I hardly knew what I was doing. All I knew was, she had me there, aleman and Maud were esg. I felt her speak, bent my head forward, then took it sharply back.

    Oh! she cried. Her grip grew slack. Oh! Oh!

    Shes beied, said Dr Christie. I thought he was talking about her. Then I saw he meant me. He took a whistle from his pocket and gave it a blow.

    Fods sake, I cried, wont you hear me? They have tricked me, they have tricked me—!

    The woman grabbed me again—about the throat, this time; and as I turned in her arms she hit me hard, with the points of her fingers, in my stomach. I think she did it in such a way, the doctors did not see. I gave a jerk, and swallowed my breath. Then she did it again. Heres fits! she said.

    Watch your hands! called Dr Graves. She may snap.

    Meanwhile, they had got me into the hall of the house and the sound of the whistle had brought awo men. They were pulling on broer cuffs over their coat-sleeves. They did not look like doctors. They came and caught hold of my ankles.

    Keep her steady, said Dr Graves. Shes in a vulsion. She may put out her joints.

    I could not tell them that I was not in a fit, but only wihat the woman had hurt me; that I was anyway not a lunatic, but sane as them. I could not say anything, f to find my breath. I could only croak. The men drew my legs straight, and my skirts rose to my knees. I began to be afraid of the skirts rising higher. That made me twist about, I suppose.

    Hold her tight, said Dr Christie. He had brought out a thing like a great flat spoon, made of horn. He came to my side and held my head, and put the spoon to my mouth, between my teeth. It was smooth, but he pushed it hard and it hurt me. I thought I should be choked: I bit it, to keep it from going down my throat. It tasted bad.

    I still think of all the other peoples mouths it must have gone in, before mine.

    He saw my jaws close. Now she takes it! he said. Thats right. Hold her steady. He looked at Dr Graves. To the soft room? I think so. Nurse Spiller?

    That was the woman that held me by the throat. I saw her nod to him, and then to the men in the cuffs, and they turned so that they might walk with me, further into the house. I felt them do it and began tle again. I was not thinking, now, of Gentleman and Maud. I was thinking of myself. I was growing horribly afraid. My stomach ached from the nurses fingers. My mouth was cut by the spoon. I had ahat, ohey got me into a room, they would kill me.

    A thrasher, aint she? said one of the men, as he worked for a better grip on my ankle.

    A very bad case, said Dr Christie. He looked into my face. The vulsion is passing, at least. He raised his voice. Dont be afraid, Mrs Rivers! We know all about you. We are your friends. We have brought you here to make you well.

    I tried to speak. Help! Help! I tried to say. But the spoon made me gobble like a bird. It also made me dribble; and a bit of dribble flew out of my mouth and struck Dr Christies cheek. Perhaps he thought I had spat it. Anyway, he moved quickly back, and his face grew grim. He took out his handkerchief.

    Very good, he said to the men and the nurse, as he wiped his cheek. That will do. Now you may take her.

    They carried me along a passage, through a set of doors and a room; then to a landing, another passage, another room—I tried to study the way, but they had me on my back: I could make out only so many drab-coloured ceilings and walls. After about a minute I khey had got me deep into the house, and that I was lost. I could not cry out. The nurse kept her arm about my throat, and I still had the spoon of horn in my mouth. When we reached a staircase they took me down it, saying, To you, Mr Bates, and, Watch this turn, its a tight one!—as if I might be, not a sack of feathers

    now, but a trunk or a piano. Not once did they look me in the face. Finally, one of the men began to whistle a tune, and to beat out the time of it, with his finger-ends, on my leg.

    Then we reached another room, with a ceiling of a paler shade of drab; ahey stopped. Careful, now, they said.

    The men put down my legs. The woman took her arm from my ned gave me a push. It was only a little push ahey had so pulled and shaken me about, I found I staggered and fell. I fell upon my hands. I opened my mouth and the spoon fell out. One of the men reached, quick, to take it. He shook the spit from it. Please, I said.

    You may say please, now, said the woman. Then she spoke to the men. Gave me a crack with her head, upoeps. Look here. Am I bruised? I believe you shall be. Little devil!

    She put her foot to me. Now, does Dr Christie have you here to give us all bruises? Eh, my lady? Mrs What-is-your-name? Mrs Waters, or Rivers? Does he?

    Please, I said again. I aint Mrs Rivers. She aint Mrs Rivers? Hear that, Mr Bates? And I aint Nurse Spiller, I dare say. And Mr Hedges aint himself. Very likely.

    She came closer to me, and she picked me up about my waist; and she dropped me. You could not say she threw me, but she lifted me high a me fall; and me being just then so dazed and so weak, I fell badly.

    Thats for crag my face, she said. Be glad we aint on stairs, or a roof. Crack me again—who knows?—we might be. She pulled her vas apron straight, and leaned and caught hold of my collar. Right, lets have this gown off. You may look like thuoo. Thats nothing to me. Why, what small little hooks! And my hands hard, is it? Used to better, are you? I should say you are, from what Ive heard. She laughed. Well, we dont keep ladies maids, here. We has Mr Hedges and Mr Bates. They still stood, watg, at the door. Shall I call them over?

    I supposed she meant to strip me bare; which I would rather die first, than endure. I got on to my knees and twisted from her.

    You may call who you like, you great bitch, I said, in a pant. You aint having my dress.

    Her face grew dark. Bitch, am I? she answered. Well!

    And she drew back her hand and curled her fingers into a fist, and she hit me.

    I had grown up in the Bh, surrounded by every kind of desperate dodger and thief; but I had had Mrs Sucksby for a mother, and had never been hit. The blow knocked me almost out of my head. I put my hands to my face, and lay down in a crouch; but she got the gown off me anyway—I suppose she was used to getting gowns off lunatics, and had a trick for it; a she got hold of my corset and took that. Theook my garters, and then my shoes and stogs, and finally my hair-pins.

    Theood, darker-faced than ever, and sweating.

    There! she said, looking me over in my petticoat and shimmy. Theres all your ribbons and laces gone. If you chokes yourself now, itll be no business of ours. You hear me? Mrs Aint-Mrs-Rivers? You sit in the pads for a night, and stew. See how you care for that. vulsions? I think I know a temper from a fit. Kick all you like in here. Put out your joints, chew your tongue off. Keep you quiet. We prefers them quiet, makes our job nicer.

    She said all that, and she made a bundle of my clothes and swung them over her shoulder; and then she left me. The me with her. They had seen her hit me, and dohing. They had watched her take my stogs and stays. I heard them pull off their paper cuffs. One began to whistle again. Nurse Spiller closed the door and locked it, and the whistling grew very much fainter.

    When it had grown so faint I could no longer hear it, I got to my feet. Then I fell down again. My legs had been pulled so hard they shook like things of rubber, and my head was ringing, from the punch. My hands were trembling. I was, not to put too fine a point on it, properly funked. I went, on my ko the door, to look at the key-hole. There was no hahe door itself was covered in a dirty vas, padded with straw; the walls were covered in padded

    vas, too. The floor had oil-cloth on it. There was a single bla, very much torn and staihere was a little tin pot I was meant to piddle in. There was a window, high up, with bars on. Beyond the bars were curling leaves of ivy. The light came in green and dark, like the water in a pond.

    I stood and looked at it all, in a sort of daze—hardly believing, I think, that those were my cold feet on the oil-cloth floor; that it was my sore face, my arms, that the green light struck. Then I turned back to the door and put my fio it—to the key-hole, to the vas, to the edge, ao try and pull it. But it was tight as a clam—and, what was worse, as I stood plug at it I began to make out little dints and tears in the dirty vas—little crests, where the weave was worn—that I uood all at once must be the marks left by the finger-nails of all the other lunatics—all the real lunatics, I mean—who had been put in that room before me. The thought that I was standing, doing just what they had done, was horrible. I stepped away from the door, the daze slipped from me, and I grew wild with fright. I flung myself back, and began to beat at the padded vas with my hands. Each blow made a cloud of dust.

    Help! Help! I cried. My voice sourange. Oh, help! They have put me in here, thinking Im mad! Call Richard Rivers! I coughed. Help! Doctor! Help!  you hear me? I coughed again. Help!  you hear me—?

    And so on. I stood and called, and coughed, a upon the door—only stopping, now and then, to put my ear to it, to try to tell if there might be anyone near—for I t say how long; and no-one came. I think the padding was too thick; or else, the people that heard me were used to lunatics calling, and had learned not to mind. So then I tried the walls. They were also thick. And when I had given up banging and shouting, I put the bla and the little tin pot together in a heap beh the window, and climbed orying to reach the glass; but the tin pot buckled, and the bla slithered and I fell.

    At last I sat on the oil-cloth floor and cried. I cried, and my own tears stung me. I put my fiips to my cheek a about my

    swelling face. I felt my hair. The woman had pulled it to take the pins out, and it lay all about my shoulders; and when I took up a length of it, meaning to b it, some of it came away in my hands. That made me cry worse than ever. I dont say I was much of a beauty; but I thought of a girl I knew, who had lost her hair to a wheel in a workshop—that hair had never grown back. Suppose I should be bald? I went over my head, taking out the hair that was loose, w if I ought to keep it, perhaps for making a wig with later; but there was not much of it, after all. In the end I rolled it up and put it in a er.

    And as I did that, I saw something, pale upon the floor. It looked like a crumpled white hand, and it gave me a start, at first; then I saw what it was. It had fallen out of my bosom when the nurse had got the gown off me, and been kicked out of sight. There was the mark of a shoe upon it, and one of its buttons was crushed.

    It was that glove of Mauds, that I had taken that m from her things a to hold on to, as a keepsake of her.

    I picked it up and tur over and over in my hands. If I had thought myself funked, a minute before—well, that funking was nothing to what I felt now, looking at that glove, thinking of Maud, and of the awful trick that she aleman had played me. I hid my fa my arms, for very shame. I walked, from one wall to another, and from that to another: if I oried to be still, it was as if I was resting on needles and pins—I started up, g out and sweating. I thought of all my time at Briar, when I had supposed myself such a sharper, and been such a simpleton. I thought of the days I had spent, with those two villains—the looks the one must have giveher, the smiles. Leave her alone, why dont you? I had said to him, feeling sorry for her. And then, to her: Dont mind him, miss. He loves you, miss. Marry him. He loves you.

    He will do it like this . . .

    Oh! Oh! I feel the sting of it, even now. Then, I might really have beeed. I walked, and my bare feet went slap, slap, slap on the oil-cloth; and I put the glove to my mouth and I bit it. Him I suppose I expected er of. It was her I thought of most—that

    bitch, that shat— Oh! To think I had ever looked at her and taken her for a flat. To think I had laughed at her. To think I had loved her! To think I had thought she loved me! To think I had kissed her, ilemans o think I had touched her! To think, to think—!

    To think I lay on the night of her wedding with a pillow over my head, so I should not hear the sound of her tears. To think that, if I had listened, I might have heard—might I? might I?—the sound of her sighs.

    I could not bear it. I fot, for the moment, the little detail of how, in swindling me, she had only turned my own trick bayself. I walked, and moaned, and swore, and cursed her; I gripped and bit and twisted that glove, until the light beyond the window faded, and the room grew dark. No-one came to look at me. No-one brought me food, own, or stogs. And though I was warm at first, from all the walking, when at last I grew so tired I found I must lie upon the bla or drop, I became cold; and then I could not get warm again.

    I did not sleep. From the rest of the house there came, every so often, queer noises—shouts, and runni and, ohe blowing of the doctors whistle. At some hour of the night it began to rain, and the water went drip against the window. In the garden, a dog barked: I heard that and began to think, not of Maud, but of Charley Wag, of Mr Ibbs and Mrs Sucksby—of Mrs Sucksby in her bed, the empty place beside her, waiting for me. How long would she wait?

    How soon would Gentleman go to her? What would he say? He might say I was dead. But then, if he said that, she would ask for my body, to bury.—I thought of my funeral, and who would cry most. He might say I was drowned or lost in marshes. She would ask for the papers to prove it. Could those papers be faked? He might say I had taken my share of the money, and cut.

    He would say that, I k. But Mrs Sucksby wouldnt believe him. She would see through him like he was glass. She would hu. She had not kept me seventeen years to lose me now, like this! She would look in every house in England, until she found me!

    Thats what I thought, as I grew calmer. I thought I must only speak with the doctors and they would see their mistake a me go; but that anyway, Mrs Sucksby would e, and I should get out like that.

    And when I was free, I would go to wherever Maud Lilly was, and—wasnt I my mothers own daughter, after all?—I would kill her.

    You  see what little idea I had of the awfulness of the fix I was really in.

    m, the woman who had thrown me about came bae. She came, not with the two men, Mr Bates and Mr Hedges, but with another woman—hey called them there; but they we藏书网re no more han I was, they only got that work through being stout and having great big hands like mahey came into the room and stood and looked me over. Nurse Spiller said,

    Here she is.

    The other, who was dark, said,

    Young, to be mad.

    Listen here, I said, very carefully. I had worked this out. I had heard them ing, and had got to my feet and put my petticoat straight, and tidied my hair. Listen here. You think I am mad. I am not. I am not the lady you and the doctors suppose me to be, at all. That lady, and her husband—Richard Rivers—are a pair of swindlers; and they have swindled you, and me, and just about everybody; and it is very important that the doctors know it, so I may be let out and those swindlers caught. I—

    Right in the face, said Nurse Spiller, speaking ay words. Right here, with her head.

    She put her hand to her cheek, close to her nose, where there was the smallest, fai mark of crimson. My own face, of course, was swollen like a pudding; and I dare say my eye was almost black. But I said, still carefully,

    I am sorry I hurt your face. I was only so thrown, to be brought in here, as a lunatic; when all the time it was the other lady, Miss Lilly—Mrs Rivers—that was meant to e.

    Agaiood and looked me over.

    You must call us nurse when you speak to us, the dark one said at last. But between you and me, dear, we would rather you didnt speak to us at all. We hear that muonsense—well. e along. You must be bathed, so that Doctor Christie may look at you. You must be put in a gown. Why, what a little girl! You must be no more than sixteen.

    She had e close, and made to catch at my arm. I drew away from her.

    Will you listen to me? I said.

    Listen to you? La, if I listeo all the rubbish I heard in this house, I should go mad myself. e on, now.

    Her voice, that had started off mild, greer. She took hold of my arm. I flinched from the feel of her fingers. Watch her, said Nurse Spiller, seeiwitch.

    I said, If youll only not touch me, Ill go with you, wherever you want.

    Ho! said the dark hen. Theres manners. e with us, will you? Very grateful, Im sure.

    She pulled me and, when I tugged against her grip, Nurse Spiller came to help her. They got their hands beh my arms and more or less lifted me, more or less dragged me, out of the room. When I kicked and plained—which I did, from the shock of it—Nurse Spiller got those great hard fingers of hers into my arm-pit, and jabbed. You t see bruises in an arm-pit. I think she k. Shes off! she said, when I cried out.

    Thats my head ringing for the rest of the day, said the other. And she gripped me tighter and shook me.

    Then I grew quiet. I was afraid I should be punched again. But I was also looking hard at the ere taking—at the windows and the doors. Some doors had locks. All the windows had bars on. They looked over a yard. This was the back part of the house— what should have been, in a house like Briar, the servants part. Here it was giveo nurses. We met two or three of them as we walked. They wore aprons and caps, and carried baskets, or bottles, or sheets.

    Good m, they all sang out.

    Good m, my nurses answered.

    New un? one asked at last, with a nod at me. e up from the pads? Is she bad?

    Cracked Nan the cheek.

    She whistled. They should bring em in bound. Young, though, aint she?

    Sixteen, if shes a day.

    Im seventeen, I said.

    The new nurse looked at me, in a sidering sort of way.

    Sharp-faced, she said, after a minute.

    Aint she, though?

    Whats her trouble? Delusions?

    And the rest, said the dark nurse. She dropped her voice. Shes the one—you know?

    The new nurse looked more ied. This one? she said. Looks too slight for that.

    Well, they e in all sizes . . .

    I didnt know what they meant. But being held up for strao study, and talk and smile over, made me ashamed, and I kept silent. The woma off on her way and my two nurses gripped me tight again and took me, down another passage, to a little room. It might have once been a pantry—it was very like Mrs Stiless pantry, at Briar—for there were cupboards, with locks upon them, and an arm-chair and a sink. Nurse Spiller sat down in the chair, giving a great sigh as she did so. The other  water in the sink. She showed me a slip of yello and a dirty flannel.

    Here you are, she said. And then, when I did nothing: e on. Youve hands, havent you? Lets see you wash.

    The water was cold. I wet my fad arms, then made to wash my feet.

    That will do, she said, when she saw me do that. Do you think Dr Christie cares how dusty your toes are? Here, now. Lets see your linen. She caught hold of the hem of my shimmy, then turned her head to Nurse Spiller, who nodded. Good, aint it? Too good for

    this house. Thatll boil up to nothing, that will. She gave it a tug. You take that off, dear. We shall keep it, quite safe, against the day you leave us.—What, are you shy?

    Shy? said Nurse Spiller, yawning. Dont waste our time. And you, a married lady.

    I aint married, I said. And Ill thank you both to keep your hands off my linen. I want my own gown back, and my stogs and shoes. I need only speak with Dr Christie, and then youll be sorry.

    They looked at me and laughed.

    Hoity-toity! cried the dark nurse. She wiped her eyes. Dear me. e, now. Its no use growing sulky. We must have your lis nothing to me and Nurse Spiller, its the rules of the house. Heres a new set, look, and a gown and—look here—slippers.

    She had goo one of the cupboards and brought out a set of greyish uhings, and a wool gown, and boots. She came bae, holding them, and Nurse Spiller joined her; and it was no good then how hard I argued and cursed, they got hold of me and stripped me bare. Wheook off my petticoat, that glove of Mauds fell out. I had had it uhe waistband. I bent and caught it up. Whats that? they said at ohen they saw it was only a glove. They looked at the stitg ihe wrist.

    Heres your own name, Maud, they said. Thats pretty work, that is.

    You shant have it! I cried, snatg it back. They had taken my clothes and my shoes; but I had walked and torn and bitten that glove all night, it was all I had to keep my nerve up. I had the idea that, if they were to take it, I should be like a Samson shorn. Perhaps they noticed a look in my eye.

    One gloves no use, after all, said the dark o Nurse Spiller, quietly. And remember Miss Taylor, who had the buttons on a thread that she called her babies? Why, shed take the hand off, that tried to get a hold of one of those!

    So they let me keep it; and then I stood limp ahem dress me, through fear they would ge their minds. The clothes were

    all madhouse things. The corset had hooks instead of laces, and was too big for me.—Never mind, they said, laughing. They had chests like boats. Plenty of room frowing in. The gown was meant to be a tartan, but the colours had run. The stogs were short, like a boys. The shoes were of india-rubber.

    Here you are, derella, said the dark nurse, putting them on me. And then, looking me over: Well! You shall bounce like a ball all right, in those!

    They laughed again then, for quite a mihen they did this. They sat me in the chair and bed my hair and made it into plaits; and they took out a needle and cotton, and sewed the plaits to my head.

    Its this, or cut it, the dark nurse said when I struggled; and no skin off my her way.

    Let me see to it, said Nurse Spiller. She fi off—two or three times, as if by act, putting the point of the needle to my scalp. That is another place that dont show cuts and bruises.

    And so, betweewo of them, they got me ready; and theook me to the room that was to be mine.

    Mind, now, you remember your manners, they said as we walked. Start going off your head again, we shall have you ba the pads, or plunge you.

    This aint fair! I said. This aint fair, at all!

    They shook me, and did not answer. So then I fell silent and, again, tried hard to study the way they took me. I was also growing afraid. I had had an idea in my head—that I think I had got from a picture, or a play—of how a madhouse should be; and so far, this house was not like it. I thought, They have got me in the place where the doctors and nurses live. Now theyll take me to the mad bit.—I think I supposed it would be something like a dungeaol. But we walked only down more drab-coloured corridors, past door after drab-coloured door, and I began to look about me and see little things—such as, the lamps being ordinary brass ones, but with strong wire guards about the flames; and the doors having fancy latches, but ugly locks; and the walls having, here and there, hahat looked as though they might, if you turhem,

    ring bells. And finally it broke upohat this was the madhouse after all; that it had once been an ordinary gentlemans house; that the walls had used to have pictures and looking-glasses on them, and the floors had used to have rugs; but that now, it had all been made over to madwomen—that it was, in its way, like a smart and handsome person gone mad itself.

    And I t say why, but somehow the idea was worse and put me in more of a creep than if the place had looked like a dungeon after all.

    I shuddered and slowed my step, then almost stumbled. The india-rubber boots were hard to walk in.

    e on, said Nurse Spiller, giving me a prod.

    Which do we want? asked the other nurse, looking at the doors.

    Fourteen. Here we are.

    All the doors had little plates screwed to them. We stopped at one of them, and Nurse Spiller gave a knock, then put a key to the lod tur. The key lain one, shined from use. She kept it on a  inside her pocket.

    The room she took us into was not a proper room, but had been made, by the building of a wooden wall, inside another.—For, as I said, that house had been all chopped up and made crazy. The wooden wall had glass at the top, that let in light from a window beyond it, but the room had no window of its own. The air was close. There were four beds in it, along with a cot where a nurse slept. Three of the beds had women beside them, getting dressed. One bed was bare.

    This is to be yours, said Nurse Spiller, takio it. It laced very he nurses cot. This is where we puts our questionable ladies. Try a queer trick here, Nurse Ba shall know all about it. Shant you, Nurse Ba?

    This was the nurse of that room. Oh, yes, she said. She nodded and rubbed her hands. She had some ailment that made her fingers very fat and pink, like sausages—an unlucky ailment, I suppose, for someoh a name like hers—and she liked to rub them often. She looked me over in the same cool way that all the other nurses had, and she said, as they had,

    Young, aint you?

    Sixteen, said the dark nurse.

    Seventeen, I said.

    Sixteen? We should call you the child of the house, if it werent for Betty. Look here, Betty! Heres a fresh young lady, look, almost ye. I should say she  run very quick up and down a set of stairs. I should say shes got  ways. Eh, Betty?

    She had called to a woman who stood at the bed across from mine, pulling a gown on reat fat stomach. I thought her a girl at first; but wheurned and showed her face, I saw that she was quite grown-up, b<q></q>ut a simpleton. She looked at me in a troubled sort of way, and the nurses laughed. I found out later that they used her more or less as they would a servant, and had her running every sort of chore; though she was—if you could believe it—the daughter of a very grand family.

    She ducked her head while the nurses laughed, and cast a few sly looks at my feet—as if to see for herself how quick they might be, really. At last one of the other two women said quietly,

    Dont mind them, Betty. They seek only to provoke you.

    Who spoke to you? said Nurse Spiller at once.

    The woman worked her lips. She was old, and slight, and very pale in the cheek. She caught my eye, then glanced away as if ashamed.

    She seemed harmless enough; but I looked at her, and at Betty, and at the other woman there—a woman who stood, gazing at nothing, pulling her hair before her fad I thought that, for all I khey might be so many maniacs; and here was I, being obliged to make a bed among them. I went to the nurses. I said,

    I wont stay here. You t make me.

    t we? said Nurse Spiller. I think we know the law. Your orders been signed, aint it?

    But this is all a mistake!

    Nurse Ba yawned and rolled her eyes. The dark nurse sighed. e, Maud, she said. Thats enough.

    My name aint Maud, I answered. How many times do I have to tell you? It aint Maud Rivers!

    She caught Nurse Bas eye. Hear that? She will speak like that, by the hour.

    Nurse Ba put her knuckles to her hips and rubbed them.

    Dont care to speak nicely? she said. Aint that a shame! Perhaps shed like a situation as a nurse. See how shed like that. Spoil her white little hands, though.

    Still rubbing her own hands against her skirt, she gazed at mine. I gazed with her. My fingers looked like Mauds. I put them behind my back. I said,

    I only got hands so white through being maid to a lady. It was that lady that tricked me. I—

    Maid to a lady! The nurses laughed again. Well, dont that take the cake! We got plenty girls suppose themselves duchesses. I never met ohat thought herself a duchesss maid! Dear me, thats hat is. We shall have to put you i, give you polish and a cloth.

    I stamped my foot.

    For fucks sake! I cried.

    That stopped them laughing. They caught hold of me, and shook me; and Nurse Spiller hit me again about the face—upon the same spot as before—though not so hard. I suppose she thought the old bruise would cover up the he pale old woman saw her do it and gave a cry. Betty, the idiot girl, began to moan.

    There, now youve set them off! said Nurse Spiller. And heres the doctors due, any minute.

    She shook me again, the me stagger away so she might put straight her apron. The doctors were like kings to them. Nurse Ba went to Betty, to bully her out of her tears. The dark nurse ran to the old woman.

    You finish fastening your buttons, you creature! she said, waving her arms. And you, Mrs Price, you take your hair from out your mouth this instant. Havent I told you a huimes, you shall swallow a ball of it, and choke? Im sure I dont know why I warn you, we should all be glad if you did . . .

    I looked at the door. Nurse Spiller had left it open, and I wondered if I might reach it if I ran. But from the room o

    ours—and then, from all down the corridor, from all the other rooms assed—there came, as I wohe sound of doors being unlocked and opened; and then the grumbling voices of he odd shriek. Somewhere, a bell was rung. That was the signal that meant the doctors were ing.

    And I thought, after all, that I should make a far better case for myself in standing and talking quietly with Dr Christie, than in running at him in a pair of rubber boots. I moved close to my bed, putting my ko it to keep my leg from trembling; and I felt for my hair, meaning to tidy it—fetting, for the moment, that they had stitched it to my head. The dark nurse went off, running. The rest of us stood in silence, listening out for the sound of the doctors footsteps. Nurse Spiller shook her fi me.

    You watch your filthy tongue, you trollop, she said.

    We waited for about ten mihen there was a stir in the passage and Dr Christie and Dr Graves came walking very quickly into the room, their heads bent over Dr Gravess note-book.

    Dear ladies, good m, said Dr Christie, looking up. He went first to Betty. How are you, Betty? Good girl. You want your medie, of course.

    He put his hand to his pocket and brought out a piece of sugar. She took it, and curtseyed.

    Good girl, he said again. Then, moving past her: Mrs Price. The ell me you have been giving in to tears. That is not good. What will your husband say? Shall he be pleased to think you melancholy? Hmm? And all your children? What shall they think?

    She answered in a whisper: I dont know, sir.

    Hmm?

    He took her wrist, all the time murmuring traves, who finally made some note in his book. Then they walked to the pale old lady.

    Miss Wilson, what plaints have you for us today? asked Dr Christie.

    the usual ones, she answered.

    Well, we have heard them many times. You need not repeat them.

    The want of pure air, she said quickly.

    Yes, yes. He looked at Dr Gravess book.

    And of wholesome food.

    You will find the food wholesome enough, Miss Wilson, if you will only sample it.

    The frigid water.

    A tonic, for shattered nerves. You know this, Miss Wilson.

    She moved her lips, and swayed on her feet. Then all at once she cried out: Thieves!

    I jumped at the sound. Dr Christie looked up at her. Thats enough, he said. Remember your tongue. What have you upon it?

    Thieves! Devils!

    Your tongue, Miss Wilson! What do we keep upon it? Hmm?

    She worked her mouth; then said, after a minute:

    A curb.

    That is right. A curb. Very good. Draw it tight. Nurse Spiller— He turned and called the o him, and spoke to her quietly. Miss Wilson put her hands to her mouth, as if to feel for a ; and again, she caught my eye, and her fingers fluttered, and she seemed ashamed.

    I should have been sorry for her, at any other time; but for now, if they had laid her and ten more ladies like her down upon the floor and told me my way out was across their backs, Id have run it with clogs on. I waited only until Dr Christie had finished giving his instrus to the nurse, and then I licked my mouth and leaned and said,

    Dr Christie, sir! He turned and came towards me.

    Mrs Rivers. He took my hand about the wrist, not smiling. How are you?

    Sir, I said. Sir, I—

    Pulse rather rapid, he said quietly, traves. Dr Graves made a note of it. He turned bae. You have hurt your face, I am sorry to see.

    Nurse Spiller spoke before I could.

    Cast herself to the floor, Dr Christie, she said, while in the grip of her fit

    Ah, yes. You see, Mrs Rivers, the violence of the dition in which you arrived here. I hope you slept?

    Slept? No, I—

    Dear, dear. We ot have that. I shall have the nurses give you a draught. You shall never grow well, without slumber.

    He o Nurse Ba. She nodded back.

    Dr Christie, I said, more loudly.

    Pulse quiing, now, he murmured.

    I pulled my hand away. Will you listen to me? You have got me here, by mistake.

    Is that so? He had narrowed his eyes and was looking into my mouth. Teeth sound enough, I think. Gums may be putrid, however.—You must tell us, if they start troubling you.

    Tm not staying here, I said.

    Not staying, Mrs Rivers?

    Mrs Rivers? Fods sake, how  I be her? I stood and saw her married. You came to me, and heard me speak. I—

    So I did, he said slowly. And you told me how you feared for your mistresss health; how you wished she might be kept quiet and free from harm. For sometimes it is easier—is it not?—to ask for assistan behalf of ahan for ourselves? We uand you, Mrs Rivers, very well.

    I am not Maud Rivers!

    He raised a finger, and almost smiled.

    You are not ready to admit that you are Maud Rivers. Hmm? That is quite a different thing. And when you are ready to admit to it, our work shall be done. Until then—

    You shant keep me here. You shant! You keep me, while those swindling villains—

    He folded his arms. Which swindling villains, Mrs Rivers?

    I am not Maud Rivers! My name is Susan—

    Yes?

    But here, for the first time, I faltered.

    Susan Smith, I said finally.

    Susan Smith. Of—where was it, Dr Graves? Of Whelk Street, Mayfair?

    I did not answer.

    e, e, he went on. That is all your fancy, is it not?

    It was Gentlemans fancy, I said, thrown off. That devil—!

    Which gentleman, Mrs Rivers?

    Richard Rivers, I answered.

    Your husband.

    Her husband.

    Ah.

    Her husband, I tell you! I saw them married. You may find out the vicar that did it. You may bring Mrs Cream!

    Mrs Cream, the lady you lodged with? We spoke at length with her. She told us, very sadly, of the melancholy temper that stole upon you, in her house.

    She eaking of Maud.

    Of course.

    She eaking of Maud, not me. Y her here. You show her my face, see what she says then. Bring anyohat has known Maud Lilly and me. Bring Mrs Stiles, the housekeeper at Briar. Bring old Mr Lilly!

    He shook his head. And dont you think, he said, your own husband might be supposed to know you, as well as your uncle? And your maid? She stood before us, and spoke of you, a. He lowered his voice. What had you doo her, hmm, to make her do that?

    Oh! I said, twisting my hands together. (See her colour ge now, Dr Graves, he said softly.) She wept, to trick you! Shes nothing but an actress!

    An actress? Your maid?

    Maud Lilly! Dont you hear me? Maud Lilly and Richard Rivers. They have put me here—they have cheated and tricked me—they have made you think me her, and her me!

    He shook his head again, and drew close his brows; and again, he almost smiled. Then he said, slowly and very easily:

    But, my dear Mrs Rivers, why should they go to the trouble of doing that?

    I opened my mouth. Then I closed it. For, what could I say? I still supposed that if I only told him the truth, he would believe it. But the truth was I had plotted to steal a ladys fortuhat I had made myself out a servant, when I was really a thief. If I had not been so afraid, and so tired, and so bruised from my night in the pads, I might have thought up a clever story. Now I could not think, at all. Nurse Ba rubbed her hands and yawned. Dr Christie still watched me, with a hum expression on his face.

    Mrs Rivers? he said.

    I dont know, I answered at last.

    Ah.

    He raves, and they began to move off.

    Wait! Wait! I cried.

    Nurse Spiller came forward. Thats enough from you, she said. You are wasting the doctors time.

    I did not look at her. I watched Dr Christie turn from me, and saw beyond him the pale old lady, her fingers still chafing at her mouth; and the sad-faced woman with her hair pulled all before her eyes; ay, the idiot girl, her lip gleaming with sugar; and I grew wild again. I thought, I dont care if they put me in a prison for it! Better a prison, with thieves and murderesses, than a madhouse! I said,

    Dr Christie, sir! Dr Graves! Listen to me!

    Thats enough, said Nurse Spiller again. Dont you know what busy men the doctors are? Dont you think they got better things to do than hear all your nonsense? Get back!

    I had stepped after Dr Christie and was reag for his coat.

    Please, sir, I said. Listen to me. I havent been perfectly straight with you. My name aint Susan Smith, after all.

    He had made to shake me off. Now he turned a little to me.

    Mrs Rivers, he began.

    Susan Trinder, sir. Sue Trinder, of— I was about to say, Lant Street; thehat of course I must not say it, for fear it should lead the polir Ibbss shop. I closed my eyes and

    shook my head. My brai hot. Dr Christie drew himself from my hand.

    You must not touch my coat, he said, his voice grown sterner.

    I clutched it again. Only hear me out, I beg you! Only let me tell you of the terrible plot I was made to be part of, by Richard Rivers. That devil! He is laughing at you, sir! He is laughing at all of us! He has stolen a fortune. He has fifteen thousand pounds!

    I would not let go of his coat. My voice was high, like the yelp of a dog. Nurse Spiller got her arm about my neck, and Dr Christie put his hands over mine and worked free my fingers. Dr Graves came to help him. At the feel of their hands, I shrieked. I suppose I really seemed mad, then; but it was only through the awfulness of having said nothing but the truth, and being thought to be deluded. I shrieked, and Dr Christie got out his whistle, just like before. There was a bell rung. Mr Bates and Mr Hedges came running, in their broer cuffs. Betty bellowed.

    They put me ba the pads. They let me wear the gown and boots, however; and they gave me a basin of tea.

    When I get out, youll be sorry! I said, as they closed the door on me. I got a mother in London. She is looking for me, in every house in the land!

    Nurse Spiller nodded. Is she? she said. Thats yours, and all our other ladies, then; and she laughed.

    I think the tea—which tasted bitter—must have had a draught in it. I slept through a day—or it might have been two days; and when I finally came to myself, I came to stupid. I let them take me, stumbling, back to the room with the beds. Dr Christie made his tour, and held my wrist.

    You are calmer today, Mrs Rivers, he said; and my mouth being dry, from the draught and from sleeping, it was as much as I could do to unstick my tongue from my gums, to answer,

    I aint Mrs Rivers!

    And he had gone, before I said it.

    My head grew clearer as the day wore bbr>藏书网</abbr>on, though. I lay on my bed and tried to think. They made us keep to our rooms in the

    m, and we were meant to sit and be silent—or to read, if we liked—while Nurse Ba watched. But I think what books there were in the house, the ladies had already read; for they only, like me, lay upon their beds, doing nothing, and it was Nurse Ba who sat, with her feet put up on a stool, looking over the pages of a little magazine—now and then lig one of her fat red fingers, to turn a page; and now and then chug.

    And then, at twelve, she put the magazine away and gave a great yawn, and took us downstairs for our dinners. Another nurse came to help her. e on, e on, they said. No dawdling.

    We walked in a lihe pale old lady—Miss Wilson—pressed close at my back.

    Dont be frightened, she said, of— Dont turn your head! Hush! Hush! I felt her breath on my neck. Dont be frightened, she said, of your soup.

    Then I walked faster, to be nearer Nurse Ba.

    She led us to the dining-room. They were ringing a bell there, and as we went our line was joined by other nurses, with ladies from the rooms they watched in. I should say there were sixty or so ladies kept in that house; and they seemed to me now, after my spell in the pads, a vast and horrible crowd. They were dressed as I was—I mean badly, in all sorts of fashions; and this—and the fact that some had had their hair cut to their heads; and some had lost teeth, or had their teeth taken from them; and some had cuts and bruises, and others wore vas bracelets or muffs—this made them look queerer than perhaps they really were. Im not saying they werent all mad, in their own fashions; and to me, just then, they looked mad as horse-flies. But there are as many different ways of being mad, after all, as there are of being crooked. Some were perfect maniacs. Two or three, like Betty, were only simpletons. One liked to shout bad words. Ahrew fits. The rest were only miserable: they walked, with their eyes on the floor, and sat and turheir hands in their laps, and mumbled, and sighed.

    I sat among them, and ate the dinner I was served. It was soup, as Miss Wilson had said, and I saw her looking at me, nodding her

    head, as I supped it; but I would not catch her eye. I would not catyones eye. I had been drugged and stupid, before; now I was ba a sort ht—a sort of fever ht—sweating, and twitg, and wild. I looked at the doors and windows—I think, if I had seen a window of plain glass, I should have run through it. But the windows all had bars on. I dont know what we should have done in a fire. The doors had ordinary locks, and with the right sort of tools I suppose I might have picked them. But I hadnt any kind of tool—not so much as a hair-pin—and nothing to make oh. The spooe our soup with were made of tin, and so soft, they might have been rubber. You could not have picked your h them.

    Dinner lasted half an hour. We were watched by the nurses and a few stout men—Mr Bates and Mr Hedges, and one or two others. They stood at the side of the room, and now and then walked betweeables. When one drew close I twitched and lifted up my hand and said,

    Please, sir, where are the doctors? Sir? May I see Dr Christie, sir?

    Dr Christie is busy, he said. Be quiet. He walked on.

    A lady said, You shahe doctors now. They e only in the ms. Dont you know?

    She is new here, said another.

    Where are you from? asked the first.

    From London, I said, still looking after the man. Though here they think I e from somewhere else.

    From London! she cried. Some of the other ladies said it, too: London! Ah! London! How I miss it!

    And the season just beginning. That is very hard for you. And so young! Are you out?

    I said, Out?

    Who are your people?

    What? The stout man had turned and was walking back towards us. I lifted my hand again, and waved it. Will you tell me, I said to him, where I  find Dr Christie? Sir? Please, sir?

    Be quiet! he said again, moving past.

    The lady beside me put her hand upon my arm. You must be familiar, she said, with the squares of Kensington.

    What? I said. No.

    I should say the trees are all in leaf.

    I dont know. I dont know. I never saw them.

    Who are your people?

    The stout man walked as far as the window, then turned and folded his arms. I had raised my hand again, but now let it droop.

    My people are thieves, I said miserably.

    Oh! The ladies made faces. Queer girl. . .

    The woman beside me, however, beed me close.

    Your prone? she said, in a whisper. Mioo. But see here. She showed me a ring that she wore, on a string, around her neck. It was gilt, and waones. Heres my capital, she said. Heres my security. She tucked the rih her collar, and touched her nose, and nodded. My sisters have taken the rest. They shant have this, however! Oh, no!

    I spoke to no-one, after that. When dinner was ehe ook us to a garden and made us walk about it for an hour. The garden had walls on every side, and a gate: the gate was locked, but you could see through its bars to the rest of the park that the house was set in. There were many trees there, some of them close to the great park wall. I made a note of that. I had never climbed a tree in my life, but how hard could it be? If I might get to a high enough branch I would risk breaking both my legs in a jump, if the jump meant freedom.

    If Mrs Sucksby didnt e first.

    But then, I still supposed, too, that I should make my case with Dr Christie. I meant to show him how sane I was. At the end of our hour in the garden a bell was rung, and we were taken back to the house and made to sit, until tea-time, in a great grey room that smelt of leaking gas, that they called the drawing-room; and then we were locked ba our bedrooms. I went—still twitg, still sweating—and said nothing. I did all that the other ladies—sad Mrs Price, and pale Miss Wilson, ay—did: I washed my face

    and hands, at the wash-stand, when they were finished with the water; and ed my teeth, when they had all used the brush; and put my hateful tartan gown in a tidy heap, and pulled on a night-gown; and said Amen, when Nurse Baumbled out a prayer. But then, when Nurse Spiller came to the door with a  of tea and gave me a basin of it, I took it, but did not drink it. I tipped it on the floor, when I thought no-one was looking. It steamed for a sed, then seeped between the boards. I put my foot on the place I had tipped it. I looked up, and saw Betty watg.

    Made a mess, she said loudly. She had a voice like a mans. Bad girl.

    Bad girl? said Nurse Ba, turning round. I know whos one of them, all right. Into your bed. Qui<cite></cite>ck! quick! all of you. God bless me, what a life!

    She could grumble like an engine. All the here could. We had to be quiet, however. We had to lie still. If we didnt, they came and pinched or smacked us.—You, Maud, said Nurse Ba, that first night, when I turned and trembled. Stop moving!

    She sat up, reading, and the light of her lamp shone in my eyes. Even when, after hours and hours, she put down her magazine and took off her apron and gown and got into her bed, she left a light still burning, so she could see us if we stirred in the night; and then she went straight to sleep and started sn. Her snores were like the sound of a file on iron; and made me more homesick than ever.

    She took her  of keys to bed with her, and slept with it about her neck.

    I lay with Mauds white glove in my fist, and now and then put the tip of one of its fio my mouth, imagining Mauds soft hand i; and I bit and bit.

    But I slept, at last; and whe m the doctors came ba their round with Nurse Spiller, I was ready.

    Mrs Rivers, how are you? said Dr Christie, after he had givey her sugar and spent a minute looking over Mrs Prid Miss Wilson.

    I am perfectly clear in my head, I said.

    He looked at his watch. Splendid!

    Dr Christie, I beg you—!

    I dipped my head and caught his eye, and I told him my story, all ain—how I was not Maud Rivers, but had only been put in his house through a terrible trick; how Richard Rivers had had me at Briar as Maud Lillys servant, so I might help him marry her and, afterwards, make her out to be mad. How they had swindled me and taken her fortune, all for themselves.

    They have played me false, I said. They have played you false! They are laughing at you! You dont believe me? Bring anyone from Briar! Bring the vicar of the church they were married in! Bring the great church book—youll see their names put there, ao them, my own!

    He rubbed his eye. Your name, he said. Susan—what are you calling it, now?—Trinder?

    Susan— No! I said. Not in that book. It is Susan Smith, in there.

    Susan Smith, again!

    Only in there. They made me put it. He showed me how! Dont you see?

    But now I was almost weeping. Dr Christie began to look grim. I have let you say too much, he said. Yrowied. We ot have that. We must have calm, at all times. These fancies of yours—

    Fancies? God help me, its the plairuth!

    Fancies, Mrs Rivers. If you might only hear yourself! Terrible plots? Laughing villains? Stolen fortunes and girls made out to be mad? The stuff of lurid fi! We have a name for your disease. We call it a hyper-aesthetie. You have been enced to overindulge yourself in literature; and have inflamed yans of fancy.

    Inflamed? I said. Over-indulge? Literature?

    You have read too much.

    I looked at him and could not speak.

    God help me, I said at last, as he turned away, if I  read two words in a row! As for writing—give me a pencil, and Ill put you

    down my name; and thats as much as I should ever be able to put, though you sit me down and make me try it for a year!

    He had begun to walk to the door of the room, with Dr Graves close behind him. My voice was broken, for Nurse Spiller had caught hold of me to keep me from following after. How dare you speak, she said, to the doctors backs! Dont pull from me! I should say youre wild enough to be put ba the pads. Dr Christie?

    But Dr Christie had heard my words and had tur the door and was looking at me in a new sort of way, his hand at his beard. He gla Dr Graves. He said quietly,

    It would show us, after all, the extent of the delusion; and may even serve to startle her out of it. What do you say? Yes, give me a page from your note-book. Nurse Spiller, let Mrs Rivers go. Mrs Rivers— He came bae and gave me the little piece of paper that Dr Graves had torn from his book. The his hand to his pocket and brought out a pencil, and made to give me that.

    Watch her, sir! said Nurse Spiller, when she saw the pencils point. Shes a sly ohis one!

    Very good, I see her, he answered. But I do not think she means us any harm. Do you, Mrs Rivers?

    No, sir, I said. I took the pencil in my hand. It trembled. He watched me.

    You may hold it better than that, I think, he said.

    I moved it in my fingers, and it fell. I picked it up. Watch her! Watch her! said Nurse Spiller again, ready to make anrab at me.

    I am not used to holding pencils, I said.

    Dr Christie nodded. I think you are. e, write me a line upon this paper.

    I t, I said.

    Of course you . Sit ly on the bed ahe paper on your khat is how we sit to write, is it not? You know it is. Now, write me your name. You  do that, at least. You have told us so. Go on.

    I hesitated, then wrote it. The paper tore beh the lead. Dr

    Christie watched and, when I had fiook the sheet from me and showed it traves. They frowned.

    You have written Susan, said Dr Christie. Why is that?

    It is my name.

    You have written badly. Did you do so on purpose? Here. He gave me the paper back. Write me out a line, as I requested first.

    I t. I t!

    Yes, you . Write a single word, then. Write me this. Write: speckle.

    I shook my head.

    e, e, he said, this word is not difficult. And you know the first letter of it, we have seen you write that already.

    Again, I hesitated. And then, because he watched so closely— and because, beyond him, Dr Graves and Nurse Spiller and Nurse Ba, and even Mrs Prid Miss Wilson, also tilted their heads to see me do it—I wrote an S. Then I made a hazard at the other letters. The word went on and on, and grew larger as I wrote.

    You still press hard, Dr Christie said.

    Do I?

    You know you do. And your letters are muddled, and very ill-formed. What letter is this? It is one of your own imagining, I think. Now, am I to uand that your uncle—a scholar, I believe?—would tenance work like this, from his assistant?

    Here was my moment. I quivered right through. Then I held Dr Christies gaze and said, as steadily as I could:

    I havent an uo my name. You mean old Mr Lilly. I dare say his niece Maud writes ly enough; but you see, I aint her.

    He tapped at his .

    For you, he said, are Susan Smith, or Trinder.

    I quivered again. Sir, I am!

    He was silent. I thought, Thats it! and almost swooned, with relief. Theurraves and shook his head.

    Quite plete, he said. Isnt it? I dont believe I ever saw a case so pure. The delusioending even to the exercise of the motor faculties. Its there we will break her. We must study on this,

    until our course of treatment is decided. Mrs Rivers, my pencil if you please. Ladies, good-day.

    He plucked the pencil from between my fingers, and turned, a us. Dr Graves and Nurse Spiller went with him, and Nurse Ba locked the door at their backs. I saw her turn the key, and it was just as if she had struck me or knocked me down: I fell upon my bed and broke out g. She gave a tut—but they were too used to tears in that house, it was nothing to see a woman sitting at dinner, weeping into her soup, or walking about the garden g her head off. Her tut turned into a yawn. She looked me over, then looked away. She sat in her chair and rubbed her hands, and winced. You think youve torments, she said, to me or to all of us. Have these knuckles for an hour—have these thumbs. Heres torments, with mustard on. Heres torments, with whips. Oh! Oh! God bless me, I think I shall die! e, Betty, be a good girl to your poor old nurse. Fety oi, will you?

    She still held her  of keys. The sight of them made me cry worse. She shook one free, ay took it to the nurses cupboard, unlocked the door, and brought out a jar of grease. The grease was white and hard, like lard. Betty sat, took a handful of it, and began to work it into Nurse Bas swollen fingers. Nurse Ba winced again. Then she sighed, and her face grew smooth.

    That finds the mark! she said; ay chuckled.

    I turned my head into my pillow and closed my eyes. If the house had been hell, and Nurse Ba the Devil, ay a demon at her side, I could not have been more wretched. I cried until I could o more.

    And then there came a movement beside my bed, and then a voice, very gentle.

    e, my dear. You must not give in to tears.

    It was the pale old lady, Miss Wilson. She had put out her hand to me. I saw it, and flinched.

    Ah, she said then. You shrink from me. I dont wo it. I am not quite in my right mind. You will grow used to that, here. Hush! Not a word. Nurse Ba watches. Hush!

    She had taken a handkerchief from her sleeve, and made signs that I should dry my face. The handkerchief was yellow with age, but soft; and the softness of it, and the kindness of her look— which, for all that she was mad, was the first piece of kihat anyone had shown me since I came to the house—made me begin tain. Nurse Ba looked over. Ive got my eye on you, she said to me. Dont think I havent. Thetled ba her chair. Betty still worked grease into her fingers.

    I said quietly,

    You mustnt think I cry so easily as this, at home.

    I am sure you do not, answered Miss Wilson.

    Im only shtehey will keep me here. I have been done very wrong. They say I am mad.

    You must keep your spirit. This house is not so hard as some others. But nor is it perfectly kind. The air of this room, for example, that we must breathe, like oxen in a stall. The suppers. They call us ladies, yet the food—the merest pap!—I should blush to see it served to a gardeners boy.

    Her voice had risen. Nurse Ba looked ain, and curled her lip.

    I should like to see you blush, you phantom! she said.

    Miss Wilson worked her mouth and looked embarrassed.

    A reference, she said to me, to my pallor. Will you believe me if I tell you, there is a substan the water here, related to chalk—? But, hush! No more of that!

    She waved her hand, and looked for a moment so mad, my heart quite sank.

    Have you been here very long? I asked, when her fluttering hand had fallen.

    I believe—let me see—we know so little of the passing seasons ... I should say, many years.

    Two-and-twenty, said Nurse Ba, still listening. For you were quite an old hand—were you not?—when I first e in as a young one. And that was fourteen years, this autumn.—Ah, press harder, Betty, there! Good girl.

    She pulled a face, let out her breath, and her eyes closed. I

    thought in horror, Two-and-twenty years!—and the thought must have shown on my face, for Miss Wilson said,

    You must not think you shall stay so long as that. Mrs Pries, every year; but her husband has her home again, when the worst of her spells are past. It was a husband, I think, who signed your order? It is></a> my brother who keeps me here. But men want wives, when they may do without their sisters. Her hand rose. I would speak plainer, if I could. My tongue— You uand.

    The man, I said, that has put me here, is a dreadful villain; and only pretends to be my husband.

    That is hard for you, said Miss Wilson, shaking her head and sighing. That is the worst of all.

    I touched her arm. My heart, that had sunk, now rose like a float—so hard, it hurt me.

    You believe it, I said. I looked at Nurse Ba; but she had heard me and opened her eyes.

    Dont make anything of that, she said, in a fortable voice. Miss Wilson believes all sorts of nonsense. Only ask her, now, what creatures live in the moon.

    Curse you! said Miss Wilson. I told you that as a fidence!— You may see, Mrs Rivers, how they work to diminish my standing.—Does my brother pay a guinea a week for you to abuse me? Thieves! Devils!

    Nurse Baade a show of rising from her chair and making her hands into fists; and Miss Wilson grew quiet again. I said, after a moment,

    You may think what you like about the moon, Miss Wilson. Why shouldnt you? But when I tell you I have been put in here by swindlers and am perfectly right in my head, I say no more tharuth. Dr Christie shall find it out, in time.

    I hope he will, she answered. I am sure he will. But you know, it is your husband who must sign you out.

    I stared at her. Then I looked at Nurse Ba. Is that true? I asked. Nurse Baodded. I began to weep again. Then, God help me, Im done for! I cried. For that shyster never, never will!

    Miss Wilson shook her head. So hard! So hard! But perhaps he

    ill visit, and take a ge of heart? They must let us see our vis-tors, you know; that is the law.

    I wiped my face. He wont e, I said. He knows that, if he did, I would kill him!

    She looked about her, in a sort of fear. You must not say such things, in here. You must be good. Dont you know, that they have ways of taking you, of binding you— That they have water—

    Water, murmured Mrs Price, in a shuddering way.

    Thats enough! Nurse Ba said. And you, Miss Muffet—she meaop stirring up the ladies.

    And again, she showed her fist.

    So then we all fell silent. Betty worked the grease in for another minute or two, then put the jar away a back to her bed. Miss Wilso her head and her gaze grew dark. Mrs Priow and the out a murmur or a moan from behind her veil of hair. From the room  door there came a burst ed shrieking. I thought of Mr Ibbss sister. I thought of all my home, and all the people in it. I began, again, to sweat. I felt suddenly I think as a fly must feel, when ed ihread of a spider. I got to my feet and walked from one wall of the room to the other, and back.

    If only there was a window! I said. If only we might see out. And then: If only I had never left the Bh!

    Will you sit down? said Nurse Ba.

    Then she cursed. There had e a knog at the door, and she must get up from her chair to a. It was another nurse, with a paper. I waited until their heads were close together, then stole baiss Wilson. Desperation was beginning to make me sly.

    Listen to me, I said quietly. I must get out of here, quick as I . I have people in London, with money. Ive a mother. Youve been here so long, you must know of a way. What is it? Ill pay you fork, I swear.

    She looked at me, and then drew back. I hope, she said, in an ordinary tone, I hope you dont suppose that I was the kind of girl brought up to speak in whispers?

    Nurse Ba looked round and stared.

    You, Maud, she said. What are you doing now?

    Whispering, said Betty, in her gruff voice.

    Whispering? Ill whisper her, all right! Get back to your bed and leave Miss Wilson alone. t I turn my back a mihout you start up trying to tamper with the ladies?

    I supposed she guessed I had been trying to escape. I went bay bed. She stood at the door with the other nurse, and said something to her in a murmur. The other nurse wrinkled her hen they looked me over in the same cool, nasty way that I had seen other nurses look at me, before.

    I was still too ignorant then, of course, to know what the nasty look meant. God help me, though!—for I was to find out, soon enough.

 Chapter Fifteen

    Until then, however, I didnt trouble myself to wonder; for I still supposed I should get out. Even when a week went by, and then another, I supposed it. I only uood at last that I must give up my idea that Dr Christie would be the man to release me— for if he believed that I was mad when I went in, thehing I said as time went on only seemed to serve to make him think me madder. Worse than that, he still held firm to his idea that I should be cured, and know myself again, if I might only be made to write. You have been put too much to literary work, he said on one of his visits, and that is the cause of your plaint. But sometimes we doust work by paradoxical methods. I mean to put you to literary wain, to restore you. Look here. He had brought me something, ed in paper. It was a slate and chalk. You shall sit with this blank slate before you, he said, and before this day is done, you shall have writte—ly, mind!—your name. Your true name, I mean. Tomorrow you shall write me the start of

    an at of your life; and you shall add to it, on each day that follows. You shall recover the use of your faculty of reason, as you recover your facility with the pen

    And so he made Nurse Ba keep me sitting with the chalk in my hand, for hours at a stretch; and of course, I could write nothing, the chalk would crumble to a powder—or else, gro and slippery from the sweating of my palm. Then hed e bad see the empty slate, and frown and shake his head. He might have Nurse Spiller with him. Aint you wrote a word? shed say. And heres the doctors spending all their time to make you well. Ungrateful, I call that.

    When hed gone, shed shake me. And when Id cry and swear, shed shake me harder. She could shake you so, you thought your teeth were being rattled out of your head. She could shake you until you were sick.—Got the grips, shed tell the other hen, with a wink; and the nurses would laugh. They hated the ladies. They hated me. They thought that when I spoke in the way that was natural to me, I did it to tease them. I know they put it out that I got special attentions from Dr Christie, through pretending to be low. That made the ladies hate me, too. Only mad Miss Wilson was now and then kind to me. Once she saw me weeping over my slate and, when Nurse Bas back was turned, came over and wrote me out my name—Mauds name, I mean. But, though she meant it well, I wished she hadnt do; for when Dr Christie came and saw it, he smiled and cried, Well done, Mrs Rivers! Now we are half-way there! And whe day, I again could make nothing but scribbles, of course he thought me shamming.

    Keep her from her dinner, Nurse Ba, he said sternly, until she writes again.

    So then, I wrote out: Susan, Susan—I wrote it, fifty times. Nurse Ba hit me. Nurse Spiller hit me, too. Dr Christie shook his head. He said my case was worse than he had thought, and needed another method. He gave me drinks of creosote—had the nurses hold me, while he poured it into my mouth. He talked ing a leech-man in, to bleed my head. Then a new lady came to the house, who would speak nothing but a made-up language she said

    was the language of snakes; and after that he passed all his time with her, prig her with needles, bursting paper bags behind her ear, scalding her with boiling water—looking for ways to startle her into speaking English.

    I wished he would go on prig and scalding her for ever. The creosote had almost choked me. I was frightened of leeches. And his leaving me alo seemed to me, would give me more time for sitting and planning my escape in. For I still thought of nothing but of that. It got to June. I had gone in there some time in May. But I still had spirit enough to learn the lie of the house, to study the windows and doors, looking out for weak ones; and every time Nurse Ba took out her  of keys, I watched, and saw which did what. I saw that, as far as the locks on the bedroom and passage doors went, one key worked them all. If I could slip that key from a nurses , I could make my escape, I was certain of it. But those s were stout; and eaurse kept her keys very close; and Nurse Ba—arned I might be crafty—kept hers closest of all. She gave them up only to Betty when she wanted something got out from her cupboard; and theook them back at once, and dropped them into her pocket.

    I never saw her do it, without trembling in a hopeless rage. It seemed too hard that I—of all people in the world!—should be kept so low, so long, from everything that was mine, by a single key—a single, simple key! not even a fancy key, but a plain one, with four straight cuts upon it that, given the right kind of blank and file, I knew I should have been able, in half a moment, to fake up. I thought it, a huimes a day. I thought it as I washed my face, and as I took my dinner. I thought it as I walked the little garden; as I sat in the drawing-room, hearing ladies mumble and weep; as I lay in my bed, with the nurses lamp blazing in my eyes. If thoughts were hammers or picks I should have beeen thousand times over. But my thoughts were more like poisons. I had so many, they made me sick.

    It was a dull sort of siess, not like the sharp panic that had gripped me and made me sweat, in my first days there. It was a kind

    of creeping misery, that crept so slow, and was so much a part of the habits of the house—like the colour of the walls, the smell of the dinners, the sound of weeping and shrieks—I did not know it had gained upon me, until too late. I still said, to everyone who spoke to me, that I was quite in my right mind—that I was there, through a mistake— that I was not Maud Rivers, and must be let out at once. But I said it so often, the wrew soft—like s losing their faces through being too much spent. One day at last, I walked with a lady in the garden and said it again; and the lady looked at me in pity.

    I thought the same thing, once, she said kindly. But you see, Im afraid you must be mad, since you are here. There is something queer about us all. You need only look about you. You need only look at yourself.

    She smiled—but, as before, she smiled in a kind of pity; then she walked on. I stopped, however. I had not thought, I could not say in how long, of how I must look, to others. Dr Christie kept no looking-glasses, for fear they should get smashed, and it seemed to me now that the last time I had gazed at my own face was at Mrs Creams—was it at Mrs Creams?—when Maud had made me put on her blue silk gown—was it blue? or had it been grey?—and held up the little mirror. I put my hands to my eyes. The gown was blue, I was certain of it. Why, I had been wearing it when they got me into the madhouse! They had taken it from me—and they had taken, too, Mauds mothers bag, and all the things that were in it—the brushes and bs, the lihe red prunella slippers—I never saw those again. Instead— I looked down at myself, at the tartan dress and rubber boots. I had grown almost used to them. Now I saw them again for what they were; and wished I might see them better. The nurse who had beeo watch us was sitting with her eyes closed, dozing in the sun, but a little to the left of her was the window that looked into the drawing-room. It was dark, and showed the line of cirg ladies, clear as a mirror. One of them had stopped, and had her hand at her face.—I blinked. She blinked. She was me.

    I went slowly towards her, and looked myself over, in horror.

    I looked, as the lady had said, like a lunatic. My hair was still

    sewn to my head, but had grown or worked loose from its stitches, and stood out in tufts. My face was white but marked, here and there, with spots and scratches and fading bruises. My eyes were swollen—from want of sleep, I suppose—a the rims. My face was sharper than ever, my neck like a stick. The tartan gown hung on me like a laundry bag. From beh its collar there showed the dirty white tips of the fingers of Mauds old glove, that I still wore o my heart. You could just make out, on the kid-skin, the marks of my teeth.

    I looked, for perhaps a minute. I looked, and thought of all the times that Mrs Sucksby had washed and bed and shined my hair, when I was a girl. I thought of her warming her bed before she put me in it, so I should not take chills. I thought of her putting aside, for me, the te morsels of meat; and smoothing my teeth, when they cut; and passing her hands ay arms and legs, to be sure that they grew straight. I remembered how close and safe she had kept me, all the years of my life. I had goo Briar, to make my fortune, so I might share it with her. Now my fortune was gone. Maud Lilly had stolen it and given me hers. She was supposed to be here. She had made me be her, while she was loose in the world, and every glass she gazed at—as say, in milliners shops, while she was fitted with gowns; or ires; or in halls, as she went dang—every glass showed her to be everything I was not— to be handsome, and cheerful, and proud, and free—

    I might have raged. I think I began to. Then I saw the look in my eye, and my face frightened me. I stood, not knowing what I should do, until the nurse on duty woke up, and came and jabbed me.

    All right, Miss Vanity, she said with a yawn. I dare say your heels are worth looking at, too. So lets see em. She pushed me bato the middle of the turning line; and I bowed my head and walked, watg the hem of my skirt, my boots, the boots of the lady in front—anything, anything at all, to save me from lifting my gaze to the drawing-room window and seeing again the look in my own mad eye.

    That, I suppose, was at the end of Ju might have been sooner,

    though. It was hard to know what dates were what. It was hard to tell so much as the day—you only knew another week had gone by when, instead of spending all m on your bed, you were made to stand in the drawing-room and listen while Dr Christie read prayers; then you k was a Sunday. Perhaps I ought to have made a mark, like victs do, for every Sunday that came round; but of course, for many weeks there seemed no point—each time one came I thought that, by the , I should have got out. Then I began to grow muddled. It seemed to me that some weeks had two or three Sundays in them. Others seemed to have none. All we could tell for certain was, that spring had turo summer: for the days grew long, the sun grew fiercer; and the house grew hot, like an oven.

    I remember the heat, almost more than anything. It was enough to make you mad all by itself. The air in our rooms, for instance, became like soup. I think one or two ladies actually died, through breathing that air—though of course, being medical men, Dr Graves and Dr Christie were able to pass off their deaths as strokes. I heard the nurses say that. They grew bad-tempered as the days grew warm. They plained of headaches and sweats. They plained of their gowns. Why I stay here, looking after you, in wool, theyd say, pulling us about, when I might be at Tunbridge Asylum, where the nurses all oplin—!

    But the fact of it was, as we all knew, no other madhouse would have had them; and they wouldnt have gone, anyway. They had it too easy. They talked all the time of how troublesome and sly their ladies were, and showed off bruises; but of course, the ladies were far too dazed and miserable to be sly, the trouble came all from the nurses when they fancied some sport. The rest of the time their job was the slightest one you  imagine, for they got us i seven oclock—gave us those draughts, to make us sleep—then they sat till midnight reading papers and books, making toast and cocoa, doing fancy-work, whistling, farting, standing at the door and calling down the hall to each other, even slipping in and out of each others rooms when they were especially bored, leaving their ladies locked up and unguarded.

    And in the ms, when Dr Christie had made his round, they would take off their caps, unpin their hair, roll down their stogs and lift their skirts; and they gave us neers and made us stand beside them and fan their great white legs.

    Nurse Ba did, anyway. She plained of the heat more than anyone, because of the it her hands. She had Betty rubbing grease into her fien times a day. Sometimes she would scream. And when the weather was at its warmest she put two a basins beside her bed and slept with her hands in water. That gave her dreams.

    Hes too slippy! she cried one night. And then, in a mumble: There, Ive lost him ...&quot;

    I also dreamed. I seemed to dream every time I closed my eyes. I dreamed, as you might suppose I would, of Lant Street, of the Bh, of home. I dreamed of Mr Ibbs and Mrs Sucksby.— Those were troubling dreams, however; often I woke weeping from dreams like that. Now and then I dreamed only of the madhouse: I would dream I had woken and had my day. Then I really would wake, and have the day still to do—ahe day was so like the day I had dreamed, I might as well have dreamed them both.— Those dreams bewildered me.

    The worst dreams of all, however, were the dreams I began to have as the weeks slipped by and the nights grew hotter and I began to get more and more muddled in my mind. They were dreams of Briar, and of Maud.

    For I never dreamed of her as I knew she really was—as a viper or a thief. I never dreamed of Gentleman. I only ever used to dream that we were ba her uncles house, and I was her maid. I dreamed we walked to her mrave, or sat by the river. I dreamed I dressed her and brushed her hair. I dreamed—you t be blamed,  you, for what you dream?—I dreamed I loved her. I knew I hated her. I knew I wao kill her. But sometimes I would wake, in the night, not knowing. I would open my eyes and look about me, and the room would be so warm everyone would have turned and fretted in their beds—I would see Bettys great bare leg, Nurse Bas sweating face, Miss Wilsons arm. Mrs

    Price put back her hair as she slept, rather in the way that Maud had used to do: I would gaze at her in my half-sleep and quite fet the weeks that had passed, sihe end of April. I would fet the flight from Briar, fet the wedding in the black flint church, fet the days at Mrs Creams, the drive to the madhouse, the awful trick; fet I meant to escape, and what I plao do when I had do. I would only think, in a kind of panic, Where is she? Where is she?—and then, with a rush of relief: There she is . . .1 would y eyes again and, in an instant, be not in my bed at all but in hers. The curtains would be let down, and she would be beside me. I would feel her breath. How close the night is, tonight! she would say, in her soft voice; and then: Im afraid! Im afraid—!

    Dont be frightened, I would always answer. Oh, dont be frightened.—And at that moment, the dream would slip from me and I would wake. I would wake in a kind of dread, to think that, like Nurse Ba, I might have said the words aloud—hed, or quivered. And then I would lie and be filled with a terrible shame. For I hated her! I hated her!—a I khat, every time, I secretly wished that the dream had gone on to its end.

    I began to be afraid I would rise in my sleep. Say I tried to kiss Mrs Price, or Betty? But if I tried to stay awake, then I grew bewildered. I imagined fearful things. Those nights were queer nights. For though the heat made us all grow stupid, it also now and the ladies—even quiet, obedient ladies—into fits. You caught the otion of it from your bed: the shrieking, the ringing of bells, the pounding of runni. It broke into the hot and silent night, like a clap of thunder; and though you knew, each time, what it was, still the sounds came sely—and sometimes one lady would set off another; and then you would lie and wonder whether that might off you, and you would seem to feel the fit gathering inside you, you would start to serhaps to twitch—oh, those were dreadful nights! Betty might moan. Mrs Price would start to weep. Nurse Ba would rise: Hush! Hush! shed say. She would open the door, lean out and listen. Then the shrieking would stop, the footsteps begin to fade. Thats got her, shed say. Now, will they pad her, I wonder, or plunge her?—and at that word, plunge,

    Betty would moan again, and Mrs Prid even old Miss Wilson would shudder and hide their heads. I didnt know why. The word eculiar one and no-one would explain it: I could only suppose it must involve being pumped, like a drain, with a black rubber sucker. That thought was so horrible that soon whenever Nurse Ba said it I began to shudder, too.

    I dont know what youre quaking at, she would say to all of us, nastily, as she went back to her bed. Wasnt one of you that went off, was it?

    But then, oime, it was. We woke to the sound of ark></mark>king and found sad Mrs Pri the floor beside her bed, biting her fingers so hard she was making them bleed. Nurse Ba went for the bell, and the men and Dr Christie came running: they bound Mrs Prid carried her off downstairs, and when they brought her back, an hour later, her gown and her hair were streaming water and she looked half-drowned.—I learhen that being plunged meant being dropped in a bath. That gave me some fort, at least; for it seemed to me that being bathed could not be nearly so bad as being suckered and pumped . . .

    I still knew nothing, nothing, nothing at all.

    Then something happehere came a day—I think it was the hottest day of all that stifling summer—that turned out to be Nurse Bas birthday; and on the night of it, she had some other nurses e secretly to our room, to give them a party. They did this, sometimes, as I think I have said. They werent allowed to, and their talking made it harder than ever for the rest of us to sleep; but we should never have dared tell a doctor—for then the nurses would have put it down to delusions and, after, hit us. They made us lie very still, while they sat about playing cards or dominoes, drinking lemonade and, sometimes, beer.

    They had beer on this night, on at of it being Nurse Bas birthday night; and because it was hot they took too much of it and got drunk. I lay with the sheet ay face, but kept my eyes half open. I dared not try to sleep while they were there, in case I dreamed of Maud again; for it had got with me what you might call—or what Dr Christie, I suppose, might call—a morbid fear, of

    giving myself away. And then again, I thought I ought to keep awake, in case they drank so much they drank themselves into a stupor; for then I could rise and steal their keys . . .

    They did not, however. Instead, they grew livelier and more noisy and red in the face, and the room grew hotter. I think that now and then I did fall into a doze: I began to hear their voices like the far-off, hollow voices you hear in dreams. Then, every so often one of them would give a shout, or snort with laughter; the others would shush her, then snort with laughter themselves—that would bring me bayself, with a horrible jolt. At last I looked at their fat red sweating faces and their great wet open mouths, and wished I had a gun and could shoot them. They sat boasting of which ladies they had retly hurt, and how they had do. They fell to paring grips. They put their hands to one anothers, palm to palm, to see who had the biggest. Then one of them showed her arm.

    Let us see yours, Belinda, another cried then. Belinda was Nurse Ba. They all had dainty names like that. You could imagiheir mothers looking at them when they were babies, thinking they would grow up ballerinas. Go o us see it.

    Nurse Ba preteo look modest; the back her cuff. Her arm was thick as a coal-whippers, but white. When she bent it, it bulged. Thats Irish muscle, she said, e down on my grandmothers side. The other nurses felt it, and whistled. Then one of them said,

    I should say, with an arm like that, youre almost a match for Nurse Flew.

    Nurse Flew was a swivel-eyed woman with a room on the floor below. She was said to have once been a matron in a gaol. Now Nurse Ba coloured up. A match? she said. I should like to see her arm beside mihats all. Then wed see whose was the greater. A match? Ill match her, all right!

    Her voice woke Betty and Mrs Price. She looked, and saw them stirring. Get back to sleep, she said. She did not see me, watg her and wishing her dead through half-closed eyes. She showed her arm again, and again made the muscle bulge. A match, indeed, she

    grumbled. She o one of the nurses. You feturse Flew up here. Then well see. Margaretta, you get a string.

    The nurses rose, and swayed, and tittered, and the off. The first came back after a mih Nurse Flew, Nurse Spiller, and the dark-headed hat had helped to undress me on my first day. They had all been drinking together, downstairs. Nurse Spiller looked about her with her hands on her hips and said,

    Well, if Dr Christie could see you! She belched. Whats this about arms?

    She bared her own. Nurse Flew and the dark nurse bared theirs. The other nurse came back with a length of ribbon and a ruler, and they took it in turns to measure their muscles. I watched them do it, as a man in a darkened wood might, disbelieving his own eyes, watch goblins; for they stood in a ring and moved the lamp from arm to arm, and it threw strange lights and cast queer shadows; and the beer, and the heat, and the excitement of the measuring made them seem to lurd hop.

    Fifteen! they cried, their voices rising. Then: Sixteen!— Seventeeeen-and-a-half!—een! Nurse Flew has it!

    They broke their circle then, and put down the light, and fell about quarrelling—not so much like goblins, suddenly, as like sailors. You half expected them to have tattoos. Nurse Bas face was darker than ever. She said sulkily,

    As to arms, well, Ill let Nurse Flew take it this time; though Im sure fat oughtnt to t the same as muscle. She rubbed her hands across her waist. Now, what about weight? She put up her . Who here says theyre heavier than me?

    At owo or three of them got up beside her and said they were. The others tried to pick them up, in order to prove it. One of them fell down.

    Its no good, they said. Yle about so, we t tell. We need another way. What say you stand upon a chair and jump? Well see who makes the floor creak most.

    What say, said the dark-haired h a laugh, you jump oy? See who makes her creak.

    See who makes her squeak!

    They looked at Bettys bed. Betty had opened her eyes at the sound of her name—now she shut them and began to shake.

    Nurse Spiller snorted. Shed squeak for Belinda, she said, every time. Dont make it her, that aint fair. Make it old Miss Wilson.

    Shed squeak all right!

    Or, Mrs Price.

    Shed cry! gs no—

    Make it Maud!

    One of them said it—I dont know who—and, though they had all been laughing, now their laughter died. I think they looked at each other. Then Nurse Spiller spoke.

    Pass a chair, I heard her say, for standing on—

    Wait! Wait! cried another nurse. What are you thinking of? You t jump on her, itll kill her. She paused, as if to wipe her mouth. Lie on her, instead.

    And at that, I put back the sheet from my fad opened my eyes up wide. Perhaps I shouldnt have do, just then. Perhaps, after all, they had only been larking. But I put back the sheet, and they saw me looking; and then they all started laughing again and came towards me in a rush. They plucked the blas off me and took the pillow from under my head. Two of them leaned on my feet, and awo caught my arms. They did it in a moment. They were like one great hot sweati with fifty heads, with fifty panting mouths and a hundred hands. When I struggled, they pinched me. I said,

    You leave me alone!

    Shut up, they said. We arent going to hurt you. We only want to see whos heaviest out of Nurse Ba, Nurse Spiller and Nurse Flew. We only want to see which of them will make you squeak most. Are you ready?

    Get off me! Get off me! Ill tell Dr Christie!

    Someo me in the face. Someone else jerked my leg. Spoilsport, they said. Now, whos to go on her first?

    I will, I heard Nurse Flew say, and the others moved back a little for her to e forward. She was smoothing down her gown. Have you got her? she said.

    Weve got her.

    Right. Hold her still

    Then they pulled me tight, as if I were a wet sheet and they meant t me. My thoughts, at that moment, arent fit to be described. I was sure they would tear the arms and legs off me. I was sure they would snap my bones. I started to shout and, again, I was stru the fad jerked about; so then I fell silent. Then Nurse Flew got on to the bed and, lifting up her skirt, k astride of me. The bed gave a creak. She rubbed her hands and fixed me with her swivel-eye. Here I e! she said, making to fall upon me. But the fall never came, though I screwed up my fad drew in my breath, to take it. Nurse Ba had stopped her.

    No dropping, she said. Dropping wont be fair. Go down slowly, or not at all.

    So Nurse Flew moved back, then came slowly forward, and lowered herself down by her hands and knees until her weight was all upohe breath I had drawn in was all squeezed out. I think, if I had had a floor underh me instead of a bed, she would have killed me. My eyes, my nose and mouth, began to run. Please—! I said.

    She cries Please! said the dark-haired hat means five points to Nurse Flew!

    They eased off tuggihen. Nurse Flew kissed my cheek and got off me, and I saw her stand with her hands above her head, like the winner of a boxing match. I sucked in my breath, I spluttered and coughed. Then they drew me tight again, for Nurse Spillers turn. She was worse than Nurse Flew—not heavier, but more awkward, for she lay with the points of her limbs, her knees and her elbows and her hips, pressing hard into mine; and her corset was a stiff one, with edges that seemed to cut me like a saw. Her hair had an oil upon it and smelt sour, and her breath was loud, like thunder, in my ear. e on, you little bitch, she said to me, sing out!—but I had some pride, even then. I closed my jaws and wouldnt, though she pressed and pressed; at last the nurses cried, Oh, shame! No p..oints for Nurse Spiller at all!—and she gave a final grind to her knees, and swore, and got off. I lifted my head

    from the mattress. My eyes were streaming water, but beyond the circle of nurses I could see Betty and Miss Wilson and Mrs Price, looking on and shaking but pretending to sleep. They were afraid of what might be doo them. I dont blame them. I let my head fall back, and again shut tight my jaws. Now came Nurse Ba. Her cheeks were still flushed, and her swollen hands so red against the white of her arms, she might have had gloves on.

    She sat astride of me as Nurse Flew had, and flexed her fingers.

    Now, Maud, she said. She caught hold of the hem of my nightgoulled it and made it tidy. She patted my leg. Now then, Miss Muffet. Whos my own good girl?

    Then she came upon me. She came faster thahers, and the shod the weight of her was awful. I cried out, and the nurses clapped. Ten points! they said. Nurse Ba laughed. I felt the shudder of it, like rolling-pins; and that made me screw up my eyes and cry out louder. Then she shuddered again, on purpose. The nurses cheered. Then she did this. She pushed herself up on her hands, so that her face was above me but her bosom and stomad legs still hard on my own; and she moved her hips. She moved them in a certain way. My eyes flew open. She gave me a leer.

    Like it, do you? she said, still moving. No? We heard you did.

    And at that, the nurses roared. They roared, and I saw on their faces as they gazed at me that nasty look I had seen before but never uood. I uood it now, of course; and all at once I guessed what Maud must have said to Dr Christie, that time at Mrs Creams. The thought that she had said it—that she had said it, befentleman, as a way of maki to be mad—struck me like a blow to the heart. I had had many such blows, since I left Briar; but this, just then, seemed like the worst. It was as if I were filled with gunpowder, and had just been touched with a match. I began tle, and to shriek.

    Get off me! I shrieked. Get off me! Get off me! Get off!

    Nurse Ba felt me wriggle, and her laughter died. She pushed again upon me, harder, with her hips. I saw her hot red face above my own and butted it with my head. Her nose went crack. She gave a cry. There came blood on my cheek.

    Then, I t quite say what happened. I think the hat were holdi go; but I think I kept on struggling and shrieking, as if they had me still. Nurse Ba rolled from me; I think that someone—probably, Nurse Spiller—hit me; yet still my fit kept on. I have ahat Betty started up bellowing—that other ladies, in rooms close by, took up the screams and shouts from ours. I think the nurses ran. Catch up these bottles and cups! I heard one of them say, as she flew off with the others. Then someone must have taken fright and caught hold of one of the handles in the hall: there came a bell. The bell brought men and then, after another minute, Dr Christie. He ulling on his coat. He saw me, still kig and thrashing on the bed, with the blood from Nurse Bas nose upon me.

    Shes in a paroxysm, he cried. A bad one. Good Lord, what was it set her off?

    Nurse Ba said nothing. She had her hand at her face, but her eyes were on mine. What was it? Dr Christie said again. A dream?

    A dream, she answered. Then she looked at him, and started into life. Oh, Dr Christie, she said, she was saying a ladys name, and moving, as she slept!

    That made me shriek all ain. Dr Christie said, Right. We know our treatment for paroxysms. You men, and Nurse Spiller. Cold water pluhirty minutes.

    The men caught hold of me by the arms and picked me up. I had been pressed so hard by the hat it seemed to me now, as they set me upright, that I was beginning to float. In fact, they dragged me: I found the grazes upon my toes,  day. But I dont remember, now, being taken down from that floor, to the basement of the house. I dont remember passing the door to the pads—going on, down that dark corridor, to the room where they kept the bath. I remember the r of the faucets, the chill of the tiles beh my feet—but, only dimly. What I recall most is the wooden frame they fixed me to, at the arms and legs; and then, the creaking of it, as they wi up and swung it over the water; the swaying of it, as I pulled against the straps.

    Then I remember the drop, as they let fly the wheel—the shock,

    as they caught it—the closing of the icy water over my face, the rushing of it into my mouth and nose, as I tried to gasp—the sug of it, when I spluttered and coughed.

    I thought they had hanged me.

    I thought I had died. Then they winched me up, and dropped me again. A mio winch me, and a mio plunge. Fifteen plunges in all. Fifteen shocks. Fifteen tugs on the rope of my life.

    After that, I dont remember anything.

    They might have killed me, after all. I lay in darkness. I did not dream. I did not think. You could not say I was myself, for I was no-one. Perhaps I never was to be quite myself, again. For when I woke, everything was ged. They put me ba my old gown and my old boots and took me bay old room, and I went with them just like a lamb. I was covered in bruises and burns, yet hardly felt them. I did not weep. I sat and, like the other ladies, looked at nothing. There was talk of putting vas bracelets on me, in case I should break out in another fit; but I lay so quietly, they gave the idea up. Nurse Ba spoke with Dr Christie, in my behalf. Her eye was black where I had butted it, and I supposed that, getting me alone, she would knock me about—I think that, if she had, I would have taken the blows, unfling. But it seemed to me that she was ged, like everything else. She looked at me oddly; and when that night I lay in bed and the other ladies had closed their eyes, she caught my gaze. All right? she said softly. She gla the other beds, then looked back at me. No harm—eh, Maud? All fun, aint it? We must have our bit of fun, mustnt we? or we should go mad . . .

    I turned my face away. I think she still watched me, though. I did not care. I cared for nothing, now. I had kept up my nerve and my spirit, all that time. I had waited for my ce of esg and got nowhere. Suddenly, my memories of Mrs Sucksby and Mr Ibbs, of Gentleman, even of Maud, seemed to grow dim. It was as if my head were filled with smoke, or had a fluttering curtain across it. When I tried to go over the streets of the Bh in my mind, I found I lost my way. No-one else in that house khose streets. If

    the ladies spoke of Londohey spoke of a place they remembered from when they were girls, in Society—a place so different from the city I knew, it might as well have been Bombay. No-one called me by my own name. I began to ao Maud and Mrs Rivers; sometimes it seemed to me I must be Maud, sinany people said I was. And sometimes I even seemed to dream, not my own dreams, but hers; and sometimes to remember things, from Briar, that she had said and done, as if I had said and dohem.

    The nurses—all except Nurse Ba—grew cooler than ever with me, after the night I lunged. But I got used to being shaken and bullied and slapped. I got used to seeing other ladies bullied iurn. I got used to it all. I got used to my bed, to the blazing lamp, to Miss Wilson and Mrs Price, to Betty, to Dr Christie. I should not, now, have minded a leech. But he never brought one. He said my calling myself Maud showed, not that I was better, but only that my malady had taken a different turn, and would turn back. Until it did, there was no point in trying to cure me; so he stopped trying. I heard, however, that the truth was he had gone off cures altogether: for he had cured the lady who had spoken like a snake, and do so well her mother had taken her home; and what with that, and the ladies who had died, the house had lost money. Now, each m, he felt my heart-beat and looked into my mouth, and then moved on. He did not stay long in the bedrooms at all, ohe air grew so close and so foul. We, of course, spent most of our time there; and I even got used to that.

    God knows what else I might have got used to. God knows how long they would have kept me in that place—maybe, years. Maybe as long as poor Miss Wilson: for perhaps she—who knows?—was as sane as I had been, when her brother first put her in. I might be there, today. I still think of that and shudder. I might never have got out; and Mrs Sucksby and Mr Ibbs, aleman, and Maud— where would they be, now?

    I think of that, too.

    But then, I did get out. Blame Fortune. Fortunes blind, and works in peculiar ways. Fortu Helen of Troy to the Greeks—didnt

    it?—and a prio the Sleepiy. Fortu me at Dr Christies nearly all that summer long; then listen to who it sent me.

    This was five or six weeks, I suppose, after they had plunged me—some time in July<cite></cite>. Think how stupid I had got by then. The season was still a warm one, and we had all begun to sleep, all the hours of the day. We slept in the ms, while we waited for the dinner-bell to be rung; and, iernoons, you would see ladies all over the drawing-room, dozing, nodding their heads, dribbling into their collars. There was nothing else to do. There was nothing to stay awake for. And sleeping made time pass. I slept as much as anyone. I slept so much that when Nurse Spiller came to our room one m and said, Maud Rivers, youre to e with me, youve a visitor, they had to wake me up and tell me again; and when they had, I didnt know what they meant.

    A visitor? I said.

    Nurse Spiller folded her arms. Dont want him, then? Shall I send him home? She looked at Nurse Ba, who was still rubbing her knuckles and wing. Bad? she said.

    Like scorpions stings, Nurse Spiller.

    Nurse Spiller tutted. I said again,

    A visitor? For me?

    She yawned. For Mrs Rivers, anyway. Are you her today, or not?

    I did not know. But I rose, on shaking legs, feeling the blood rush from my heart—for if the visitor was a man then I could only think that, whether I was Maud, or Sue, or whoever I was, he must be Gentleman. My world had shrunk to that point, that I only khat I had been harmed, and that he had do. I looked at Miss Wilson. I had ahat I had said to her, three months before, that if Gentleman came I would kill him. I had meant it, then. Now the thought of seeing his face was so ued, it made me sick.

    Nurse Spiller saw me hesitate. e on, she said, if you are ing! Dont mind your hair.—I had put my hand to my head. Im sure, the madder he knows you to be, the better. Saves disappoi, dont it? She gla Nurse Ba. Then: e on!

    she said again; and I gave a twitch, then stumbled after her into the passage and dowairs.

    It was a Wednesday—that was luck, though I did not know it yet, for on Wednesdays Dr Christie and Dr Graves went off in their coach to drum up new lady lunatics, and the house was quiet. Some nurses, and one or two men, were standing about in the hall, taking breaths from the open door; one of the men held a cigarette and, when he saw Nurse Spiller, he hid it. They did not look at me, however, and I hardly looked at them. I was thinking of what was to e, and feeling sicker and stranger by the sed.

    In here, said Nurse Spiller, jerking her head towards the door of the drawing-room. Then she caught my arm and pulled me to her. And you remember: none of your fibs. The pads are nid cool, on a day like this. Aint been used in a while. My words as good as a mans, while the doctors are away. You hear me?

    She shook me. Then she pushed me into the room. Here she is, she said, in a different voice, to the person waiting there.

    I had expected Gentleman. It wasnt him. It was a fair-haired, blue-eyed boy in a blue pea-jacket, and in the first sed of my seeing him I felt a rush of mixed relief and disappoi so sharp, I almost swooned away; for I thought him a stranger, and supposed that there had been a mistake, he must have e for someone else. Then I saw him looking over my features in a bewildered sort of way; and then at last, at last—as if his fad name were slowly rising to the surfay brain, through mists or cloudy water—at last I knew him, even out of his servants suit. He was Charles, the knife-boy from Briar. He looked me over, as I have said; theilted his head and looked past me, and past Nurse Spiller, as if he thought that Maud must be ing along behind. Then he looked at me again, and his eyes grew wide.

    And it was that, that saved me. His were the first two eyes, in all the time that had passed since I left Mrs Creams, that had looked at me and seen, not Maud, but Sue. They gave me back my past. They gave me my future, too—for in the sed of standing in the doorway, meeting his gaze, seeing it slip from me and then e

    back baffled, my own fusion began to leave me and I formed a plan. I formed it whole, plete in every part.

    It was desperate.

    Charles! I said. I was not used to speaking, and it came out like a croak. Charles, you hardly know me. I think— I think I must be very ged. But oh, how good of you to e and make a visit to your old mistress!

    And I went to him and caught hold of his hand, not taking my eyes away from his; and then I pulled him to me and I whispered, almost weeping, in his ear:

    Say Im her, or Im done for! Ill give you anything at all! Say Im her! Oh, please say Im her!

    I kept hold of his hand, and wrung it. He stepped back. He had been wearing a cap, that had left a scarlet line across his brow. Now his face grew scarlet all over. He opened his mouth. He said,

    Miss, I— Miss—

    Of course, he called me that, at Briar. Thank God he did! Nurse Spiller heard him and said, in a sort of nasty satisfa, Well, aint it marvellous how quick a ladys hbbr></abbr>ead will clear, when she sees a dear face from home? Shant Dr Christie be pleased?

    I turned and caught her eye. She looked sour. She said, Will you keep your young man standing? That have e all this way? Thats right, you sit. Not too close, though, young sir, if I was you. We t say when they wont fly off and start clawing; even the meek ohats better. Now, Ill keep over here, by the door, and if she starts kig up, you sing out—all right?

    We had sat, in two hard chairs, close to the window. Charles still looked bewildered; now he also began to wink and look afraid. Nurse Spiller stood in the open doorway. It was cooler there. She folded her arms and watched us; but she also, now and then, turned her head into the hall, to nod and murmur to the nurses beyond.

    I still held Charless hand in both of mine. I could not give it up. I leaowards him, trembling, and spoke in a whisper. I said,

    Charles, I— Charles, I never was so glad to see anyone, anyone in all my life! You have— You have to help me.

    He swallowed. He said, in the same low voice,

    You are Miss Smith?

    Hush! Hush! I am. Oh, I am! My eyes began to water. But you mustnt say it here. You must say— I gla Nurse Spiller, then spoke more quietly still. You must say Im Miss Lilly. Dont

    ask me why.

    What was I thinking of? Well, the fact was I was thinking of the lady who had spoken like a snake, and the two old ladies that had died. I was thinking of what Dr Christie had said, about my malady having taken a different turn, but being sure, in time, to turn back. I was thinking that if he heard Charles say that I was Sue not Maud, he might find a way to keep me closer—perhaps bind me, pad me, plunge me, plunge Charles too.—In other words, terror had turned my brain. But I also had that plan. It was growing clearer by the sed.

    Dont ask me why, I said again. But, oh, what a trick has been played ohey have made out Im mad, Charles.

    He looked about him. This house is a house for mad people? he said. I supposed it a great hotel. I supposed I should find Miss Lilly here. And—and Mr Rivers.

    Mr Rivers, I said. Oh! Oh! That devil! He has swindled me, Charles, and goo London with mohat was to be mine. Him and Maud Lilly! Oh! What a pair! They have left me here, to die—!

    My voice had risen, I could not help it: someone else—someone really mad—might have been speaking out of my mouth. I squeezed Charless fingers, to keep from talking louder. I squeezed them, almost out of their joints. And I glanced fearfully towards Nurse Spiller at the door. Her head was turned. She had her back to the doorpost and was laughing with the nurses and the men. I looked back at Charles, meaning to speak again. But his face had ged, and stopped me. His cheek had turned from flaming scarlet, to white. He said, in a whisper,

    Mr Rivers, goo London?

    To London, I said, or to heaven knows where. To hell, I shouldnt wonder!

    He swallowed. He twitched. Theore his fingers from mine and covered his face with his hands.

    Oh! Oh! he said, in a shaking voice—just as I had. Oh, then Im ruined!

    And to my very great astonishment, he began to cry.

    His story came leaking out, then, along with his tears. It turned out that—just as I had guessed, months before—a life spent sharpening k Briar seemed a life not worth having, once Gentleman had gone. Charles had felt it so hard, he had begun to mope. He had moped so long, Mr Way the steward had taken a whip to him.

    He said he would whip me raw, he said; and he did. Lord, how he made me shriek! But that whipping was nothing—I should say, a hundred whippings would be nothing!—pared to the smarting, miss, of my disappointed heart.

    He said that, in a way that made me think he had practised it; then he held himself stiff, as if he imagined I would hit him, or laugh, and was ready to suffer any blow. But what I said—bitterly— was, I believe you. Mr Rivers makes hearts do that.

    I was thinking of Mauds. Charles seemed not to notice. He does! he said. What a gentleman! Oh, but aint he?

    His face grew shiny. He wiped his hearted g again. Nurse Spiller looked over and curled her lip. But that was all she did. Perhaps people cried a lot, when they came to see their lady relatives, at Dr Christies.

    When she had looked into the hall again, I turned back to Charles. Seeing him so miserable made me calmer in my own head. I let him shake a little longer and, as he did it, studied him closer. I saw, what I had not seen at first—that his neck was dirty, and his hair was strange—here pale and fluffy as feathers, here dark and stiff where he had wet it to make it lie smooth. There was a twig caught up in the wool of the sleeve of his jacket. His trousers were marked with dust.

    He wiped his eyes and saw me looking, and blushed harder than ever. I said quietly,

    Be a good boy now, and tell me the truth. Youve run off, havent you, from Briar?

    He bit his lip, then nodded. I said, And all for Mr Riverss sake? He nodded again. Then he drew in a shuddering breath.

    Mr Rivers used to say to me, miss, he said, that he would take me on to man for him, if only hed the money for a proper mans wages. I thought, I would rather work for him for no wages at all, than stay at Briar. But how was I to find him out, in London? Then came all that stir, with Miss Lilly taking off. The houseve been on its head sihen. We did suppose her flown after him, but np-one was quite sure. They are calling it a sdal. Half the girls have gone. Mrs Cakebreadve goo another mans kit! Now Margaret cooks. Mr Lilly aint in his right mind. Mr Way has to feed him his dinners off a spoon!

    Mrs Cakebread, I said, frowning. Mr Way. The names were like so many lights: each time one was lit, another part of my brain grew brighter. Margaret. Mr Lilly. And then: Off a spoon! And all— And all from Mauds running off with Mr Rivers?

    I dont know, miss. He shook his head. They say it took him a week to feel it. For he was calm at first; then he found some harm had been doo some of his books—or, something like that. Then he fell in a fit on his library floor. Now he t hold a pen or anything, and fets his words. Mr Way made me push him about, in a great wheeled chair; but, I could hardly go ten yards—I could hardly do anything!—for breaking out g. In the end I got sent to my auntys, to look at her black-faced pigs. They do say—he wiped his nose again—they do say that watg pigs cures melancholy. It never cured mihough ...&quot;

    I had stopped listening. There had e on a light in my head, that was brighter than all the rest. I took his hand again. Black-faced pigs? I said, screwing up my eyes. He nodded.

    His aunty was Mrs Cream.

    I suppose its like that in the try. I had hought to ask him his last name. He had slept in the very same room as me, on the same straw mattress, that was filled with bugs. When his aunty had begun to talk of the gentleman and lady that had e and beely married, he had guessed at once who they were but, hardly believing his own luck, had said nothing. He found out theyd gone off together in a coach; and from his cousin—Mrs Creams eldest son, who had talked with the

    an—he had got the name of Dr Christies house, and where it was.

    I supposed it a great hotel, he said again—again looking fearfully about him, at the wire on the lamps, the bare grey walls, the bars on the windows. He had run off from Mrs Creams three nights before, and had slept in ditches and hedges sihen.—Too late, he said, to turn back, when I got here. I asked at the gate for Mr Rivers. They looked in a book, and said I must mean his wife. Then I remembered what a kind lady Miss Maud always was; and that if anyone should talk Mr Rivers round to taking me on, she should. And now—!

    His lip began again to tremble. Really, Mr Way was right: he was far too big a boy to be so tearful, and at any other time, in any other, ordinary place, I should have hit him myself. But for now, I looked at his tears, and to my bruised and desperate eyes they were like so many pick-locks and keys.

    Charles, I said, leaning closer to him and nerving myself to seem calm. You t go back to Briar.

    I t, miss, he said. Oh, I t! Mr Way would skin me alive!

    And I dare say your aunty dont want you. He shook his head. She would call me a fool, for running off. Its Mr Rivers youre after. He bit his lip, and nodded, still g.

    Then listen to me, I said—barely speaking at all, barely whispering now, only breathing the words, for fear Nurse Spiller would catch them. Listen to me. I  take you to him. I know where he is. I know the very house! I  take you to him. But first, you must help me out of here.

    If it wasnt quite true that I knew where Gentleman was, then it wasnt quite a lie, either; for I retty certain that, once I reached London and got help from Mrs Sucksby, I should find him. But I would have lied anyway, just then. I dare say you would have, too. Charles stared at me, and wiped his face with the heel of his hand. Help you out of here, how? he said. Why maynt you walk out, miss, just whenever you please?

    I swallowed. They think Im mad, Charles. Theres an order been signed—well, never mind by who—that keeps me here. Its the law See that nurse? See her arm? Theyve got twenty nurses with arms like that; and they know how to use em. Now, look at my face. Am I mad?

    He looked, and blinked. Well—

    Of course I aint. But here, there are some lunatics so crafty, they pass as sane; and the doctors and nurses t see the differeween me, and one of them.

    Again he looked about him. Then he looked at me—just as, a moment before, I had looked at him—as if seeing me for the first time. He looked at my hair, my dress, my india-rubber boots. I drew my feet under my skirt.

    I— Im not sure, he said.

    Not sure? Not sure of what? Of whether you want to go back to your auntys and live with the pigs? Or whether you want to go and be man to Mr Rivers, in London—London, mind! Remember them elephants a boy  ride on for a shilling? Tricky choice, I call that.

    He lowered his gaze. I looked at Nurse Spiller. She had glanced our way, was yawning, and had taken out a watch.

    Pigs? I said quickly. Or elephants? Which is it to be? Fods sake, which?

    He worked his lips.   v

    Elephants, he said, after a terrible silence

    Good boy. Good boy. Thank God. Now, listen. How much money have you got?

    He swallowed. Five shillings and sixpence, he said.

    All right. Heres what you must do. You must go to any town, and find a locksmiths shop; and when you find it you must ask them for— I pressed my hand to my eyes. I thought I felt that cloudy water rising again, that flapping curtain. I nearly screamed in fright. Then the curtain drew back—for a ward key, I said, a ward key, with a one-inch blank. Say your master wants it. If the man wont sell it, you must steal one. Now, dont look like that! We shall send the man another when we reach London. When youve got the blank, keep it safe. Go o a blacksmiths. Get a file—see

    my fingers?—same width as this. Show me the width I mean. Good boy, you got it. Keep the file safe as the blank. Bring them back here,  week— Wednesday, only Wednesday will do! do you hear me?—and slip them to me. Uand me? Charles?

    He stared. I had begun to grow wild again. But then he hen his gaze moved past me awitched. Nurse Spiller had left the door-plad was headed our way.

    Times up, she said.

    We stood. I kept hold of the bay chair, to keep from sinking. I looked at Charles, as if my eyes could burn into his. I had let his hand fall, but now reached for it again.

    Youll remember, wont you, what Ive said?

    He nodded, in a frightened way. He dropped his gaze. He made to draw free his hand and step away. Then a queer thing happened. I felt his fingers move ay palm and found I could not let them go.

    Dont leave me! I said. The words came from nowhere. Dont leave me, please!

    He jumped.

    Now then, said Nurse Spiller. Weve no time for this. e on.

    She began to ungrip my fingers. It took her a moment or two. When his hand was free, Charles drew it quickly bad put his knuckles to his mouth.

    Sad, aint it? Nurse Spiller said to him, her arms about my own. My shoulders jumped. Dont you mind it, though. It takes them all like this. Better not to e at all, we say. Better not to remind em of home. Whips em up. She drew me tighter. Charles shrank away. You be sure now, to tell your people that, when you say what a sad way you found her in—wont you?

    He looked from her to me, and nodded. I said,

    Charles, Im sorry My teeth were chattering about the words. Dont mind it. Its nothing. Nothing at all.

    But I could see him looking at me now and thinking that I must be mad, after all; and if he thought that, then I was done for, I should be at Dr Christies house for ever, I should never see Mrs

    Sucksby and never have my revenge on Maud.—That thought was sharper than my fear. I willed myself calm, and Nurse Spiller at last let me go. Another nurse came forward, to see Charles to the door: they let me watch him leave, and oh! it was all I could do to keep from running after. As he went, he turned, and stumbled, a my gaze. Then he looked shocked again. I had tried to smile, and suppose the smile was dreadful.

    Youll remember! I called, my voice high and strange. Youll remember the elephants!

    The nurses shrieked with laughter then. One gave me a push. My strength was all gone, and the push knocked me over. I lay in a heap. Elephants! they said. They stood and laughed at me, until they wept.

    That week was a terrible one. I had got my own mind back, the house seemed crueller than ever, and I saw how far I had sunk before in growing used to it. Say I grew used to it again, in seven days? Say I grew stupid? Say Charles came back, and I was too fuo know him? The thought nearly killed me. I did everything I could to keep myself from slipping into a dream again. I pinched my own arms, until they were black with bruises. I bit my own tongue. Each m I woke with a horrible sehat days had slipped away and I had not noticed. What day is today? Id ask Miss Wilson and Mrs Price. Of course, they never knew. Miss Wilson always thought, Good Friday. Then Id ask Nurse Ba.

    What day is today, Nurse Ba?

    Punishment Day, shed answer, wing and rubbing her hands.

    Then there was the fear that, after all, Charles wouldnt e— that I had been too mad—that he would lose his nerve, or be overtaken by disaster. I thought of all the likely and uhings that might keep him from me—such as, his being seized by gipsies or thieves; run down by bulls; falling in with ho people, who would persuade him to go bae. One night it rained, and I thought of the ditch he was sleeping in filling up with water and him being drowhen there came thunder and lightning; and I imagined him sheltering under a tree, with a file in his hand . . .

    The whole week passed like that. Then Wednesday came. Dr Graves and Dr Christie went off in their coad, late in the m, Nurse Spiller arrived at the door to our room, looked at me and said, Well, aint we charming? Theres a certain young shaver downstairs, e back for another visit. We shall be putting out the banns, at this rate ...&quot; She led me down. In the hall, she gave me a poke. No monkeying about, she said.

    This time, Charles looked more afraid than ever. We sat in the same two seats as before and, again, Nurse Spiller stood in the door-plad larked with the nurses in the hall. We sat for a minute in silence. His cheek was white as chalk. I said, in a whisper,

    Charles, did you do it?

    He nodded.

    The blank?

    He nodded again.

    The file?

    Another nod. I put my hand before my eyes.

    But the blank, he said, in a plaining tone, cost nearly all my mohe locksmith said that some blanks are blahan others. You old me that. I got the bla he had.

    I parted my fingers, a his gaze.

    How much did you give him? I asked.

    Three shillings, miss.

    Three shillings for a sixpenny blank! I covered my eyes again. Then, Never mind, I said. Never mind. Good boy . . .

    Then I told him what he must do . I said he must wait for me, that night, oher side of Dr Christies park wall. I said he must find the spot where the highest tree grew, and wait for me there. He must wait all night, if he had to—for I could not say, for sure, how long my escape would take me. He must only wait, and be ready to run. And if I did not e at all, he must know that something had happeo stop me; and then he must e back the  night and wait again—he must do that, three nights over.

    And if you dont e, then? he asked, his eyes wide.

    If I dont e then, I said, you do this: you go to London, and you find out a street named Lant Street, and a lady that lives there,

    named Mrs Sucksby; and you tell her where I am. God help me, Charles, that lady loves me!—and shell love you, for being my friend. Shell know what to do.

    I turned my head. My eyes had filled with water. You got it? I said at last. You swear?

    He said he did. Show me your hand, I said then; and when I saw how it shook, I dared not let him try and slip me the blank and file, for fear he would drop them. He kept them in his pocket, and I hooked them out just before I left him—while Nurse Spiller looked on, laughing to see him kiss my cheek and blush. The file went up my sleeve. The blank I held on to—then, as I went upstairs, I stooped as if to tug up a stog, a fall into one of my boots.

    Then I lay on my bed. I thought of all the burglars I had ever heard of, and all the burglars boasts. I was like them, now. I had my file, I had my blank. I had my pal oher side of the madhouse wall. Now all I must do was get hold of a key, long enough to make my copy.

    I did it like this.

    That night, when Nurse Ba sat in her chair and flexed her fingers, I said,

    Let me rub your hands for you tonight, Nurse Ba, instead of Betty. Betty doesnt like it. She says the grease makes her smell like a chop.

    Bettys mouth fell open. Oh! Oh! she cried.

    God help us, said Nurse Ba. As if this heat werent enough. Be quiet, Betty!—Like a chop, did you say? And after all my kindness?

    I never! said Betty. I never!

    She did, I said. Like a chop, done up for the pan. You let me do it instead. Look how  and soft my hands are.

    Nurse Ba looked, not at my fingers, but at my face. Then she screwed up her eyes. Betty, shut up! she said. What a row, and my flesh blazing. Im sure I dont care who does it; but Id rather a quiet girl than a noisy one. Here. She put the tip of her thumb to the

    edge of the pocket in her skirt and pulled it back. Fetch em out, she said to me.

    She meant her keys. I hesitated, then put in my hand and drew them up. They were warm from the heat of her leg. She watched me do it. That littlest one, she said. I held it ahe others swing, theo the cupboard and got out the jar of grease. Betty lay oomad kicked up her heels, weeping into her pillow. Nurse Ba sat bad put up her cuffs. I sat beside her and worked the oi in, all about her swollen hands, just as I had seen it done a huimes. I rubbed for half an hour. Now and then she wihen her eyes half closed and she gazed at me from beh the lids. She gazed in a warm and thoughtful way, and almost smiled.

    Not so bad, is it? she murmured. Eh?

    I didnt answer. I was thinking, not of her, but of the night and the work to e. If my colour , she must have taken it for a blush. If I seemed strange, and scious of myself, what was that to her? We were all strahere. When at last she yawned and drew her hands away, and stretched, my heart gave a thump; but she did not see it. I moved from her side, to take the oi back to its cupboard. My heart thumped again. I had only a sed to do what I o do. The loop of keys was hanging from the lock, the one I wahe oo the doors—hanging lowest. I did not plan to steal it, she would have noticed if I had. But men came all the time to Lant Street, with bits of soap, and putty, and wax ... I caught the key up and quickly but very carefully pressed it into the jar.

    The grease took the shape of the bitting, good as anything. I looked at it ohen screwed on the lid ahe jar ba its shelf. The cupboard door I closed, but only preteo lock. The key I wiped on my sleeve. I took it back to Nurse Ba, and she opened up her pocket with the tip of her thumb, like before.

    Right in, she said, as I made to put in the keys. All the way to the bottom. Thats right.

    I would not meet her eye. I went to my bed, and she yawned, and sat in her chair and dozed, as she always did, until Nurse Spiller brought round our draughts. I had got used to taking mine, along

    with the other ladies, but tonight I tipped it away—into the mattress, this time—then gave back my empty bowl. Then I watched, in a sort of fever, to see what Nurse Ba would do . If she had goo the cupboard—say, for a paper, or a cake, or a piece of knitting, or any small thing; if she had goo the cupboard and found it open, and locked it, and spoiled my plan, I t say what I would have done. I really think I might have killed her. But anyway, she did not go. She only sat sleeping in her chair. She slept so long, I began to despair of her ever waking up again: I coughed; picked up my boot and dropped it; ground the legs of my bed against the floor—and still she slept on. Then some dream woke her. She got up, and put her nightgown on. I had my fingers ay face, and saw her do it, through the cracks: I saw her stand, rubbiomach through the cotton of her gown; and I saw her looking at all the ladies and then at me, seeming to turn some idea over in her mind . . .

    But then, she gave the idea up. Perhaps it was the heat. She yawned again, put the  of keys around her neck, got into her bed; and started sn.

    I ted her snores. When I had ted twenty I rose, like a ghost, crept back to the cupboard, and got out the jar of grease.

    Then I cut my copy. I t say how long it took. I only know, it took hours—for of course, though the file was a fine one, and though I worked with the sheets and blas bunched about my hands to muffle the sound, still the rasp of the iron seemed loud, and I dared only cut in time to Nurse Bas snores. And I could not file too quickly even then, for I had always to be matg up the blank with the impression, making sure the cuts were right; then again, my fingers would ache, I would have to stop and flex them; or theyd grow wet, the blank would slip and swivel in my hands. It was terrible work to be doing in a desperate mood. I seemed to feel the night slipping away, like so much sand—or else, Nurse Ba would fall silent, I would pause and look about me and be brought bayself—to the beds, and the sleeping ladies—and the room would seem so still I feared that time had stopped and I should be caught in it for ever. No-one called out

    that night, no-one had awful dreams, no bells were rung, everyone lay heavy in their beds. I was the only wakeful soul in the house— the only wakeful soul, I might as well have been, in all the world; except, that I khat Charles was also wakeful—was waiting, oher side of Dr Christies walls—was waiting for me; and that, beyond him, Mrs Sucksby was also waiting—perhaps, was sighing in her bed—or walking, wringing her hands and calling out my name ... It must have beehought of that, that gave me ce and made the file run true.

    For at last there came a time when I put the blank to the jar, and saw that the cuts all matched. The key was finished. I held it, in a sort of daze. My fingers were stained from the iron, and grazed from the slipping of the file, and almost numb from gripping. I dared not stay to bind them up, though. Very carefully I rose, pulled on my tartan gown, and took up my rubber boots. I also took Nurse Bas b.—That was all, just that. I lifted it from off her table, and, as I did, she moved her head: I held my breath, but she did not wake. I stood quite still, looking into her face. And I was filled, suddenly, with guilt. I thought, How disappointed shell be, when she finds how Ive tricked her!—I thought of how pleased she had got, when Id said I would rub her hands.

    Queer, the things you think at such times. I watched her another miheo the door. Slowly, slowly, I put the key in the lock. Slowly, slowly, I tur. Please, God, I whispered, as it moved. Dear God, I swear, Ill be good, Ill be hohe rest of my days, I swear— It caught, and stuck. Fuck! Fuck! I said. The wards had jammed, I had not cut true after all: now it would not turher forwards or backwards. Fuck! You fuckster! Oh! I gripped it harder, and tried again—still nothing—at last I let it go. I went silently bay bed, got Nurse Bas oi jar, stole back with it to the door, put grease across the key-hole and blew it into the lock. Then, almost fainting with fear, I gripped the key again; and this time—this time, it worked.

    There were three more doors to be got through, after that. The key did the same in all of them—got stuck, and must be greased— and every time, I shuddered to hear the grinding of the iron in the

    lock, a on faster. But no-one woke. The passages were hot and quiet, the stairs and hall quite still. The front door was bolted and latched, I didnt need a key for that. I left it open behi was as easy as the time that I had gone from Briar with Maud: only on the walk before the house did I get a fright, for as I made to cross the bit of gravel there, I heard a step, and then a voice. The voice called, softly, Hey!—I heard it, and almost died. I thought it was callihen there came a womans laugh, and I saw figures: two men—Mr Bates, I think, and another; and a nurse—Nurse Flew, with the swivel-eye. Youll get your— one of them said; but that was all I heard. They went through bushes, at the side of the house. Nurse Flew laughed again. Then the laugh got stifled, and there came silence.

    I did not wait to see what the silence would bee. I ran— lightly, at first, across the strip of gravel—then fast and hard, across the lawn. I didnt look back at the house. I didnt think about the ladies, still i. I should like to say I went and threw my key into the little walled garden, for one of them to find; but I did not. I didnt save a myself. I was too afraid. I found the tallest tree: it took me another half-hour, then, to get myself up the knots in its trunk—to fall, tain—to fall a sed time, a third, a fourth—to heave myself finally on to its lowest branch—to climb from there to the branch above—to work my way across a creaking bough until I reached the wall . . . God knows how I did it. I  only say, I did. Charles! Charles! I called, from the top of the bricks. There was no answer. But I did not wait. I jumped. I hit the ground and heard a yelp. It was him. He had waited so long, he had fallen asleep; and I almost struck him.

    The yelp made a dog bark, back at the house. That dog set off another. Charles put his hand before his mouth.

    e on! I said.

    I caught his arm. We turned our backs to the wall, and ran and ran.

    We ran through grass and hedges. The night was still dark, the paths all hidden, and I was too afraid, at first, to take the time to

    find them out. Every now and then Charles would stumble, or slow his step to press his hand to his side and find his breath, and then Id tilt my head and listen; but there was nothing to hear but birds, and breezes, and mice. Soon the sky grew lighter, and we made out the pale strip of a road. Which way? said Charles. I did not know. It had been months and months since I had stood on any kind of path and had to choose the way to take. I looked about me, and the land and the lightening sky seemed suddenly vast and fearful. Then I saw Charles looking, and waiting. I thought of London. This way, I said, beginning to walk; and the fear passed from me.

    It was like that, then, all the way: every time we met the crossing of two or three roads, I would stand for a minute and think hard of London; and just as if I were Dick Whittington, the idea would e to me which road we ought to take. When the sky grew even paler, we began to hear horses and wheels. We should have been glad of a lift, but I was afraid, each time, that the cart or coach might have bee out after us, from the madhouse. Only when we saw an old farmer driving out of a gate in a donkey-cart, did I think we could be sure he was not one of Dr Christies me ourselves in his way, and he slowed the donkey a us ride beside him for an hour. I had bed out the plaits and stitches from my hair and it stood up like coir, and I had no hat, so put a handkerchief of Charless about my head. I said that we were brother and sister, and going back to London after a stay with our aunty.

    London, eh? said the farmer. They say a man  live forty years there and never meet his neighbour. Is that right?

    He put us down at the side of the road at the edge of a town, and showed us the way we must take from there. I guessed we had gone about nine or ten miles. We had forty more to do. This was still early m. We found a bakers shop, and bought bread; but the woman in the shop looked so queerly at my hair and my gown, and my rubber boots, I wished we had given up the bread and gone hungry. We sat in a church-yard, upon the grass, against two leaning stohe church bell rang, ah started.

    Seven oclock, I said. I felt suddenly gloomy. I looked at Nurse

    Bas b. Theyll be waking up now, and finding my empty bed; if they havent found it already

    Mr Way will be polishing shoes, said Charles. His lip began to

    jump.

    Think of Mr Riverss boots, I said quickly. I bet they want a polish. London is awfully hard on a gentlemans shoes.

    Is it?

    That made him feel better. We finished our bread, and then rose and brushed the grass off. A ma by with a shovel. He looked at us rather as the woman in the bakers shop had.

    They thiinkers, said Charles, as we watched him pass.

    But I imagined men ing from the madhouse, asking about after a girl in a tartan dress and rubber boots. Lets go, I said, and we left the road again and took a quiet path that went off across fields. We kept as much as we could to the hedges, though the grass was higher there, and harder and slower to walk on.

    The sun made the air grow warm. There came butterflies, and bees. Now and then I stopped and uhe handkerchief from about my head, and wiped my face. I had never walked so far, so hard, in my life; and for three months I had not been further than round and round the little walled garden at the madhouse. There were blisters on my heels, the size of shillings. I thought, We shall never get to London!

    But each time I thought it, I thought of Mrs Sucksby, and imagihe look upon her face when I turned up at the Lant Street door. Then I thought of Maud, wherever she was; and imagined her face.

    Her face seemed dim to me, however. The dimness bothered me. I said,

    Tell me, Charles, what colour are Miss Lillys eyes? Are they brown, or blue?

    He looked at me strangely.

    I think they are brown, miss.

    Are you sure?

    I think so, miss.

    I think so, too.

    But I was not sure. I walked a little faster. Charles ran beside me, panting.

    Near noon that day we came across a row of little cottages, on the side of the path to a village. I made Charles stop, aood behind a hedge, and I watched the doors and windows. At one, a girl stood shaking cloths—though after a minute she went inside, and then the window was closed. At another, a woman with a bucket passed bad forth, not looking out. The windows of the  cottage down were all shut and dark; but I guessed there must be something behind them, worth stealing: I thought of going to the door and knog and, if no-one came, trying the latch. But as I stood, w up my here came voices, from the very last house: we looked, and there at the garden gate was a woman and two little children. The woman was tying on a bo and kissing the children good-bye.

    Now, Ja, she was saying to the biggest one, mind you watch Baby nicely. I shall be back to give you y. You may hem your hankie if you like, if youll only be careful with the needle.

    Yes, Ma, said the girl. She put her face up to be kissed, then stood oe and swung it. Her mother walked quickly away from the cottage—past me and Charles, though she didnt know it; for we were still hidden behind our hedge.

    I watched her go. Then I looked from her to the little girl—who had left the gate now, and was walking back up the path, leading her brother towards the open cottage door. Then I looked at Charles. I said,

    Charles, heres Fate turned our way at last. Give me a sixpence, will you? He felt about in his pocket. Not that one. Havent you got a brighter?

    I took the brightest he had, and gave it ara shine on the sleeve of my gown.

    What are you going to do, miss? he asked.

    Never mind. Stay here. And if anyone es, give a whistle.

    I stood and straightened my skirt; then I went out from behind the hedge and walked smartly over to the gate of the cottage, as if I

    had e along the path. The little girl turned her head and saw

    me.

    All right? I said. Youll be Ja. I just met your ma. Look here,

    what she gave me. A sixpence. Aint it a nie? She said, &quot;Please give this sixpeo my little girl Ja, and tell her to please go quick to the shop and buy flour.&quot; Said she fot, just now. Know what flour is, dont you? Good girl. Know what else your ma said? She said, &quot;My girl Ja is such a good little girl, tell her shes to have the half-pen over, for sweets.&quot; Ah. Like sweets, do you? So do I. Nice, aint they? But hard on your teeth. Never mind. I dare say you aint got all your teeth yet. Oh! Look at them dazzlers! Like pearls on a string! Better nip down the shop, before the rest e up. Ill stay here and mind the house, shall I? Dont that sixpence shine! And heres your little brother, look. Dont you want to take him with you? Good girl

    It was the shabbiest trick there was, and I hated doing it; but what  I say? I had had a shabby trick played on me. All the time I spoke, I was glang quickly about me, at the windows of the other cottages, and along the path; but no-one came. The little girl put the  in the pocket of her apron and picked up her baby brother, and staggered away; and I watched her do it, then darted into the house. It retty poor place, but in a trunk upstairs I found a pair of black shoes, more or less my size, and a print dress, put in paper. I thought the dress might have been the ohat the woman was married in, and I swear to God! I almost didnt take it; but in the end, I did.

    And I also took a black straw bo, a shaair of woollen stogs, a pie from the pantry; and a knife.

    Then I ran back to the hedge where Charles was hiding.

    Turn round, I said, as I ged. Turn round! Dont look shtened, you bloody big girl. Damn her! Damn her!

    I meant Maud. I was thinking of the little girl, Ja, ing back to the cottage with the flour and her bag of sweets. I was thinking of her mother, ing home in time for tea, and finding her wedding-gown gone.

    Damn her!

    I got hold of Mauds glove, and ripped it till the stitches gave. Then I threw it to the ground and jumped on it. Charles watched, with a look of terror on his face.

    Dont look at me, you infant! I said. Oh! Oh! But then I grew frightened of someone ing. I took the glove up again and put it baext to my bosom, and tied up the strings of the bo. I threw my madhouse gown and my rubber boots into a ditch. The blisters on my feet had opened, and were weeping like eyes; but the stogs were thies, and the black shoes were worn and soft. The dress had a pattern of roses on it, and the bo had daisies at the brim. I imagined how I must look—like a picture, I thought, of a milkmaid on a dairy wall.

    But that was just the thing, I supposed, for the try. We left the fields and the shady paths a back to the road; and after a time another old farmer came by, and he drove us another few miles; and then we walked again.

    We still walked hard. Charles was silent all the way. Finally he broke out with:

    You took them shoes and that gown, without asking. I took this pie as well, I said. Bet youll eat it, though. I said we would send the woman her clothes back, and buy her a brand-new pie, in London. Charles looked doubtful. We spent the night in the hay of an open barn, and he lay with his bae, his shoulder-blades shaking. I wondered if he might run off to Briar while I slept; and I waited until he grew quiet, thehe laces of one his boots to the laces of one of mine, so I should wake up if he tried to. He was an aggravating boy; but I knew I should do better with him than without him, just now—for Dr Christies men would be looking firl on her own, not a girl and her brother. I thought that if I had to, I would give him the slip once we reached London. But London still seemed far off. The air still smelled too pure. Some time in the night I woke, and the barn was full of cows: they stood in a circle and looked us over, and one of them coughed like a man. Dont tell me thats natural. I woke up Charles, and he was as frightened as I was. He got up and tried to run—of course, he fell down, and nearly took my foot off. I undid our laces. We went

    backwards out of the barn, then ran, then walked. We saw the sun

    rise over a hill.

    That mea, said Charles. The night had been cold as winter, but the hill was a steep one and we grew warm as we climbed. Wrhe to the top, the sun was higher in the sky and the day was lightening up. I thought, The m has broken.—I thought of the m like an egg, that had split with a crad reading. Before us lay all the green try of England, with its rivers and its roads and its hedges, its churches, its eys, its rising threads of smoke. The eys grew taller, the roads and rivers wider, the threads of smoke more thick, the farther off the try spread; until at last, at the farthest point of all, they made a smudge, a stain, a darkness—a darkness, like the darkness of the coal in a fire—a darkhat was broken, here and there, where the sun caught panes of glass and the golden tips of domes and steeples, with glittering points of light.

    London, I said. Oh, London!

 Chapter Sixteen

    Still, it took all that day to reach it. We might have found out the railway station and taken a train: but I thought we ought to keep the little money we had left, for food. We walked for a while with a boy who had a great big basket on his back, that he had filled with onions: he showed us to a place where waggons came, to pick up vegetables for the city markets. We had missed the best of the traffic, but we got a ride, in the end, with a man with a slow horse, taking scarlet beans to Hammersmith. He said Charles made him think of his son—Charles had that sort of face—so I let them ride up front together, and sat in the back of the cart, with the beans. I sat with my cheek against a crate, my eyes on the road ahead, and now and then the road would rise and show us London again, grown a little nearer. I might have slept; but I couldnt keep from watg. I watched as the roads began to be busier and the try hedges began to give way to palings and walls; I watched the leaf bee brick, the grass bee ders and dust, the ditches

    kerb-stones. When ohe cart drew close to the side of a house that asted, two ihick, with fluttering bills, I reached and tore free a strip of poster—held it for a sed, the fly. It had a picture of a hand upon it, holding a pistol. It left soot on my fingers. Then I knew I was home.

    From Hammersmith, we walked. That part of London was strao me, but I found I knew my way all right—just as I had known, in the try, which road to take at a fork. Charles walked beside me, blinking, and sometimes catg hold of the cuff of my sleeve; in the end I took his hand to lead him across a street, a his fingers stay there. I saw us reflected in the glass of a great shop window—me in my bo, him in his plain pea-jacket—we looked like the Babes in the bloody Wood.

    Then we reached Westminster, and got our first proper view of the river; and I had to stop.

    Wait, Charles, I said, putting my hand to my heart and turning away from him. I did not want him to see me so stirred up. But then, the sharpest part of my feelings being over, I began to think.

    We ought not to cross the water just yet, I said, as we walked on. I was thinking of who we might bump into. Suppose we ced upoleman? Or, suppose he ced upon us? I did not think he would put a hand upon me, himself; but fifteen thousand pounds is a deal of money, and I knew he  t bullies to do his bad work for him. I had not thought of this, until now. I had thought only of reag London. I began to look about me, in a new way. Charles saw me do it.

    What is it, miss? he said.

    Nothing, I answered. Only, Im afraid there may still be me out by Dr Christie. Lets cut down here.

    I took him down a dark and narrow street. But then I thought, a dark and narrow street would be the worst kind of street to be caught in. I turned instead—we were somewhere near Charing Cross now—into the Strand; and after a time we came to the end of a road that had one or two little stalls, selling sed-hand clothes. I went to the first we came to, and bought Charles a woollen scarf. For myself, I got a veil. The man who sold it to me teased me.

    Dont care for a hat, instead? he said. Your face is too pretty to hide.

    I held out my hand for my half-penny ge. All right, I said, impatient. Sos my arse.

    Charles flinched. I did not care. I put on the veil a better. It looked badly above my bo and pale print gown, but I thought I might pass firl with scars, or with some kind of ailment of the face. I made Charles draw the woollen scarf about his mouth and pull down his cap. When he plaihat the day was hot I said,

    If I get taken by Dr Christies spies before I bring you to Mr Rivers, how hot do you think youll find it, then?

    He looked ahead, to the crush of coaches and horses at Ludgate Hill. It was six oclock, and the traffic was at its worst.

    Then when will y me to him? he said. And how much further does he live?

    Not much at all. But, we must be careful. I have to think. Let us find somewhere quiet

    We ended up at St Pauls. We went in, and I sat in one of the pews while Charles walked about and looked at the statues. I thought, I must only get to Lant Street, and then I shall be saved; but what was w me was the thought of the story that Gentleman might have put about the Bh. Say all of Mr Ibbss nephews had had their hearts turned against me? Say I met John Vroom before I reached Mrs Sucksby? His heart did not urning; and he would know me, even behind my veil. I must be careful. I should have to study the house—make my move only when I knew how the land lay. It was hard, to be cautious and slow; but I thought of my mother, who had not been cautious enough. Look what happeo her.

    I shivered. St Pauls was cold, even in July. The glass at the windows was losing its colours, as the afternoon turo night. At Dr Christies, now, they would be waking us up to take us down to our suppers. We would have bread-and-butter, and a pint of tea . . . Charles came and sat beside me. I heard him sigh. He had his cap in his hands, and his fair hair shone. His lip erfectly pink.

    Three boys in white gow about with flames on sticks of brass, lighting more lamps and dles; and I looked at him and thought how well he would fit in among them, in a gown of his

    own.

    Then I looked at his coat. It was a good ohough rather

    marked by dust.

    How much money have we now, Charles? I said.

    We had a penny and a half. I took him to a pawn-shop on Watling Street, and we pledged his coat for two shillings.

    He cried as he ha over.

    Oh, how, he said, shall I ever see Mr Rivers now? Hell never want a boy in shirt-sleeves!

    I said we would get the coat ba a day or two. I bought him some shrimps and a piece of bread-and-butter, and a cup of tea.

    London shrimps, I said. Yum, aint they lovely?

    He did not answer. When we walked on, he walked a step behih his arms about himself, his eyes on the ground. His eyes were red—from tears, and alsrit.

    We crossed the river at Blackfriars, and from there, though I had been going so carefully, I went more carefully still. We kept away from the back lanes and alleys, and stuck to the open roads; and the twilight—which is a false light, and always a good light for doing any kind of shady business ier even than darkness—helped to hide us. Every step we took, however, was taking me closer to home: I began to see certain familiar things—eveain familiar people—a, again, a stir in my head a, that I thought would quite undo me. Then we reached Gravel Lane and the Southwark Bridge Road, turned up to the west end of Lant Street and stood looking along it; and my blood rushed so fast and my heart rose so high, I thought I should swoon. I gripped the brick wall we rested against a my head drop, until the blood went slower. When I spoke, my voice was thick. I said,

    See that black door, Charles, with the window in it? Thats the door to my own house. The lady lives there, thats been like my mother. I should like more than anything now, to run to that door; but I shant. It aint safe.

    Not safe? he said. He gazed about him, fearfully. I suppose those streets—that looked so dear to my eyes I could have lain down and kissed them—might have looked rather low to his.

    Not safe, I said again, while Dr Christies meill behind us.

    But I looked along the street, at Mr Ibbss door, and then at the window above it. It was the window to the room I shared with Mrs Sucksby, and the temptation to go closer to it was too great. I caught hold of Charles and pushed him before me, and we walked, then stood at a wall where there was a bit of shadow between two bulging bow-windows. Some kids went by, and laughed at my veil. I kheir mothers, they were neighbours of ours; and I began to be afraid again, of being seen, and reised. I thought I was a fool, after all, to have e so far dowreet; then I thought, Why dont I just make a run at the door, calling out for Mrs Sucksby? Maybe Id have do. I t say. For I had turned, as if to rearrange my bo; and while I was still making up my mind Charles put his hand to his mouth, and cried out, Oh!

    The kids that had laughed at my veil had run far dowreet, and then had parted, to let someone walk between them. It was Gentleman. He was wearing that old slouch hat, and had a scarlet cloth at his throat. His hair and whiskers were lohan ever. We watched him saunter. I think he was whistling. Then, at Mr Ibbss shop-door, he came to a stop. He put his hand to the pocket of his coat and drew out a key. He kicked his feet against the step—first the right, then the left—to knock the dust from them; theted the key in the lock, glanced idly about, a inside. He did it all, in the easiest and most familiar way you  imagine.

    I saw him, and quivered right through. But my feelings were queer. The devil! I said. I should like to have killed him, to have shot him, to have run at him and struck his face. But the sight of him had also made me afraid—more afraid than I ought to have been—as afraid as if I were still at Dr Christies and might at any momeaken, shaken, bound and plunged in water. My breath came strangely, in little catches. I dont think Charles noticed. He was thinking of his shirt-sleeves.—Oh! he still said. Oh! Oh!

    He was looking at his finger-nails, and at the smudges of dirt on his cuffs.

    I caught hold of his arm. I wao run—back, the way we had e. I wao run, more than anything. I almost did. e on, I said. e, quick. Then I looked again at Mr Ibbss door— thought of Mrs Sucksby behind it—thought of Gentleman, cool and easy at her side. Damn him, for making me afraid of my own home! I wont be chased away! I said. Well stay, but well hide. e, here. And I gripped Charles tighter and began to push him, not away from Lant Street, but further along it. There were rooming-houses, all along that side. We reached one, now. Got beds? I said, to the girl at the dot half a one, she said. Half was not enough. We went to the  house, and then the . They were both full. At last we reached the house right across from Mr Ibbss. There was a woman oep with a baby. I did not know her. That was good.

    Got a room? I said quickly.

    Might have, she answered, trying to see beyond my veil.

    At the front? I looked up and poihat one?

    That one costs more.

    Well have it for the week. Ill give you a shilling noay you the rest tomorrow.

    She made a face; but she wanted gin, I k. All right, she said. She got to her feet, put the baby oep, and took us up a slippery staircase. There was a man dead drunk on the landing. The door to the room she led us into had no lock to it, only a stone for propping it shut. The room was small and dark, with two low beds and a chair. The window had shutters closed before it, oreet-side, and there was a stick with a hook huo the glass, meant for opening them.

    You do it like this, said the woman, beginning to show us. I stopped her. I said I had a weakness of the eye and didnt care for sunlight.

    For I had seen straight away that the shutters had little holes cut ihat were more or less perfect for what I wanted; and when the woman had got our shilling off us and gone, I shut the door

    behiook off my veil and bohen put myself at the glass and looked out.

    There was nothing to see, however. Mr Ibbss shop door was still shut, and Mrs Sucksbys window dark. I watched for quite a minute before I remembered Charles. He was standing, gazing at me, squeezing his cap between his hands. In some other room a man gave a shout, and he jumped.

    Sit down, I said. I put my face back^to the window.

    I want my jacket, he said.

    You t have it. The shop is closed. We shall get it tomorrow.

    I dont believe you. You told a lie to that lady, about having a poor eye. You took that gown and those shoes, and that pie. That pie made me sick. You have brought me to a horrible house.

    I have brought you to London. Aint that what you wanted?

    I thought London would be different.

    You havehe best parts yet. Go to sleep. Well get your jacket ba the m. You shall feel like a new man then.

    How shall we get it? You just gave our shilling to that lady

    I shall get us another shilling tomorrow.

    How?

    You mustnt ask. Go to sleep. Aint you tired?

    This bedve got black hairs in it.

    Then take the other.

    That one has red hairs.

    Red hairs wont hurt you.

    I heard him sit and rub his face. I thought he might be about tain. But then, after a minute he spoke, and his voice had ged.

    Werent Mr Riverss whiskers long, though? he said.

    Werent they, I answered, my eye at the shutter still. Id say he needs a boy to trim them.

    Dont he just!

    He sighed then, and lay back upon the bed, putting his cap over his eyes; and I kept watch at the glass. I kept watch, like cats keep watch at mouse-holes—not minding the hours as they passed, not thinking of anything but what I gazed at. The night grew dark, and

    the street—that was a busy street, in summer—grew empty and still, the kids all goo their beds, the men and women e back from the public houses, the dogs asleep. Iher rooms in the house, people walked, pulled chairs across the floor; a baby cried. A

    girl—she was drunk, I suppose—laughed, on and on. Still I

    watched. Some clock struck off the hours. I could not hear bells without wing, now, a every one of them: at last came the twelve, and then the half, and I was listening out for the three-quarters—still watg, still waiting; but beginning to wonder, perhaps, what it was I thought I would see—when this happened:

    There came a light and a shadow, in Mrs Sucksbys room; and then a figure—Mrs Sucksby herself! My heart nearly flew into bits. Her hair showed white, and she had her old black taffeta gown on. She stood with a lamp in her hand, her face turned from me, her jaw moving—she was talking to someone else farther ba the room, someone who now came forward, as she moved back. A girl. A girl, very slim at the waist ... I saw her, and began to shake. She came on, while Mrs Sucksby moved about the room behiaking off her brooches and rings. She came right to the glass. She lifted her arm to rest it upon the bar of the window-sash, and theood with her brow upon her wrist, and grew still. Only her fingers moved, as they plucked idly at the lace across the window. Her hand was bare. Her hair was curled. I thought, It t be her.

    Then Mrs Sucksby spoke again, the girl lifted her face, the light of the street-lamp fell full upon it; and I cried out loud.

    She might have heard me—though I dont think she  have—for she turned her head and seemed to look at me, to hold my gaze across the dusty street and the darkness, for quite a minute. I dont think I blinked, in all that time. I dont think she did, her eyes stayed open— I saw them, and remembered their colour at last. Theurned bato the room, took a step away, caught up the lamp; and as she lowered the flame Mrs Sucksby went close to her, lifted her hands, and begin to unfasten the hooks at the back of her collar.

    Then came darkness.

    I moved back from the window. My own white face was reflected

    there, the streetlight striking it—on the cheek, beh my eye—in the shape of a heart. I turned from the glass. My cry had woken Charles, and I suppose my look eculiar.

    Miss, what is it? he said in a whisper.

    I put my hand before my mouth.

    Oh, Charles! I said. I took a couple of staggering steps towards him. Charles, look at me! Tell me who I am!

    Who, miss?

    Not miss, dont call me missl I never was a miss, though they made me out one.—Oh! She has takehing from me, Charles. She has takehing and made it hers, in spite. She has made Mrs Sucksby love her, as she made— Oh! Ill kill her, tonight!

    I ran in a kind of fever, back to the shutter, to look at the face of the house. I said, Now, might I climb to the window? I could force the bolt, creep in, and stab her as she lies sleeping. Where is that knife?

    I ran again, and caught it up and tried its edge. Not sharp enough, I said. I look<u></u>ed about me, then picked up the stohat was used as a door-stop, and drew the blade across it. Like this? I said to Charles. Or like this? Which makes the best edge? e on, e on. Youre the bloody knife-boy, arent you?

    He watched me in terror; then came and, with trembling fingers, showed me how. I ground the blade. Thats good, I said. That will feel good, with its point against her breast. Then I stopped. But, dont you think that, after all, a death by stabbing es rather quick? Had I not ought to find a slower way?—I thought of stifling, strangling, beating with a club.—Have we a club, Charles? That will take longer; and oh! I should like to have her know me, as she dies. You shall e with me, Charles. You shall help.—Whats the matter?

    He had walked to the wall and stood with his back against it, and begun to quiver.

    He said, You aint— You aint the lady you seemed to be at Briar!

    I said, Look at you. You aint the boy. That boy had nerve.

    I want Mr Rivers!

    I laughed, a mad laugh. Ive got news for you. Mr Rivers aint quite the gent you thought him, either. Mr Rivers is a devil and a rogue.

    He stepped forward. He aint!

    He is, though. He ran off with Miss Maud, told everyone I was her and put me in a madhouse. Who else do you think it was, signed my order?

    If he sig, it must have been true!

    Hes a villain.

    Hes a gem of a man! Everyo Briar said so.

    They never knew him like I did. Hes bad, hes rotten.

    He made his hands into fists. I dont care! he cried.

    You want to man for a devil?

    Better that, than— Oh! He sat upon the floor and hid his face. Oh! Oh! I was never more miserable, in all of my life. I hate you!

    And I hate you, I said, you fug nancy

    I still had the stone in my hand. I threw it at him.

    It missed him by about a foot; but the sound of it striking the wall and floor was awful. I was shaking, now, almost as badly as he was. I looked at the knife I held, then put it from me. I touched my face. My cheek and brow were wet with a horrible sweat. I went to Charles and k beside him. He tried to push me away.

    Get off me! he cried. Or, kill me now! I dont care!

    Charles, listen to me, I said, in a steadier voice. I dont hate you, truly. And you mustnt hate me. I am all youve got. You have lost your place at Briar, and your aunty dont want you. You t go back to the try now. Besides, you should never find your way out of Southwark, without my help. You should wander and grow bewildered; and London is full of cruel hard men who do unspeakable things to bewildered fair-haired boys. You might be taken by the master of a ship, and finish up in Jamaica. How should you like that? Dont cry, fods sake!—He had begun to sob.—You think I shouldnt like to cry? I have been dreadfully cheated, and the person that cheated me worst is lying at this moment in my own bed, with my own mothers arms about her. This is a greater thing than you  uand. This is a matter of life ah. I was

    foolish to say I would kill her tonight. But give me a day or two more, a me think. Theres money over there and—I swear it, Charles!—there are people there too who, ohey know how Ive been wronged, will give any kind of sum to the boy that has helped me back to them ...&quot;

    He shook his head, still g; and now, at last, I began to cry, too. I put my arm about him and he leaned into my shoulder, and we shuddered and wailed until, finally, someone in the room  dan to bang on the wall and call out for us to stop.

    There, now, I said, wiping my nose. Youre not afraid, now? Youll sleep, like a good boy?

    He said he thought he would, if I would keep beside him; and so we lay together on the bed with the red hairs in it, and he slept, with his pink lips parted, and his breaths ing even and smooth.

    But I kept wakeful, all through that night. I thought of Maud, across the street, lying breathing in Mrs Sucksbys arms, her mouth open like his, like a flower, her throat perfectly slender, and perfectly white and bare.

    By the time the m came, I had the beginnings of a plan worked out. I stood at the window and watched Mr Ibbss door for a time but then, seeing no-oirring, gave it up. That could wait. What I needed now was money. I knew how to get it. I made Charles brush his hair and put a parting in it, then took him quietly from the house, by the back way. I took him to Whitechapel—a place, I thought, far enough from the Bh for me to risk going about without my veil. I found a spot on the High Street.

    Stand here, I said. He did. Now, remember how you cried so hard last night? Lets see you do it again.

    Lets what?

    I caught hold of his arm and pi. He gave a squeal, then began to snivel. I put my hand on his shoulder and looked up and dowreet, in an anxious way. A few people gazed curiously at us. I beed them over.

    Please, sir, please, lady, I said. I just e upon this poor boy, hes e in from the try this m and has lost his master.

    you spare a couple of farthings, set him back upon his way?  you? Hes all alone and dont know no-one, dont know cery Lane from Woolwich. He has left his coat in his masters

    cart. —__God bless you, sir! Dont cry, mate! Look, this gentleman is

    giving you twopence. Here es some more! And they say Londoners hearts is hard, in the try—dont they . . .?

    Of course, the idea of a gentleman giving him money made Charles cry worse than ever. His tears were like so many mags. We made three shillings, that first day—which paid for our room; and wheried the same dodge the day after, on a different street, we made four. That got us our suppers. The mohat was left over after that I kept, along with the ticket to Charless coat, in my shoe. I wore my shoes, even in bed. I wantmy jacket, Charles would say, a huimes an hour; and every time Id aomorrow. I swear. I promise. Just one more day . . .

    And then, all day, I would stand at the shutters, my eye at the heart-shaped hole. I was watg the house, figuring out its habits. I was marking it, patient as a cracksman. I saw thieves e, bringing pieces of poke to Mr Ibbs: I saw him turn the lo his door, pull down his blind. The sight of his hands, of his ho face, made me want to weep. Id think, Why t I go to him? Then, a little later, Id see Gentleman, and be filled again with fear. Then Id see Maud. Id see her at the window. She liked to stand there, with her face against the sash—as if she kneatg, and mocked me! I saw Dainty, helping her dress in the ms, fastening up her hair. And I saw Mrs Sucksby, at night, letting it down.—Once I saw her lift a tress of it to her mouth, and kiss it.

    With eaew thing, I would press my faqe sainst the glass I stood at, it would groan in its frame. And at night, when the house was dark, I would take up my dle and walk, bad forth, bad forth, from one wall to another.

    They have got them all in their power, Id say. Dainty, and Mr Ibbs, and Mrs Sucksby; and I dare say John and even Phil. Like two great spiders, they have spun their web. Weve got to be careful, Charles. Oh, havent we! For say they know, through Dr Christie, that Ive escaped? They must know by now! They are waiting,

    Charles. They are waiting for me. She never leaves the house— thats clever!—for, in keeping there, she keeps near Mrs Sucksby. He goes, however. Ive seen him. Ive been waiting, too. They dont know that. He goes. Well make our move, ime he does. Im the fly they want. They sha me. Well send them you. They wont have thought of that! Hey, Charles?

    Charles never answered. I had kept him so long in that dark room, doing nothing, his face had got pale, and his eyes had begun tlassy, like a dolls. I want my jacket, he still said, now and then, in a feeble sort of bleat; but I think he had almost fotten what it was he wa for. For at last there came a time when he said it, and I answered: All right. Today youll get it. Weve waited long enough. Todays our day; and instead of looking pleased, he stared and looked frightened.

    Perhaps he thought he saw a certain feverish something in my eye. I dont know. It seemed to me I was thinking like a sharper, for the first time in my life. I took him back to Watling Street and got his jacket out of pawn. But I kept hold of it. Then I took him on a bus.—For a treat, I said. Look out the window, at the shops.

    I found us plaext to a woman holding a baby. I sat with the coat ay lap. Then I looked at the baby. The woman caught my eye, and I smiled.

    Pretty boy, she said. Isnt he? Wont sleep for his mother, though. I bring him on the buses and the bumping sends him off. Weve been from Fulham to Bow; now were on our way back.

    Hes a peach, I said. I leaned in and stroked his cheek. Look at them lashes! Hell break hearts, he will. Wont he!

    Then I leaned back. When the  stop came, I made Charles get off. The woman said good-bye, and from the window, as the bus moved away, she waved. But I didnt wave back. For, under cover of Charless coat, I had had a feel about her waistband; and had prigged her watch. It was a tle ladies watch, and just what I needed. I showed it to Charles. He looked at it as though it were a shat might bite him. Where did you get that? he said.

    Someone gave it to me. I dont believe you. Give me my jacket. In a minute. Give me my coat!

    We were walking on Londe. Shut up, I said, or Ill throw it over the side.—Thats better. Now, tell me this:  you

    write?

    He would not answer until I had goo the wall of the bridge and dangled his jacket over; then he began tain, but said that he could. Good boy, I said. I made him walk a little further, until we found a man hawking papers and inks. I bought a plain white sheet, and a pencil; and I took Charles back to our room and had him sit and write out a letter. I stood with my hand on the back of his neck, and watched.

    Write, Mrs Sucksby, I said.

    He said, How do you spell it?

    Dont you know?

    He frowhen wrote. It looked all right to me. I said,

    Now you write this. Write: / ut in the madhouse by that villain your friend—so called!—Gentleman—

    Yoing too fast, he said, as he wrote. He tilted his head. By that villain your friend—

    —so called!—Gentleman; and that bitch Maud Lilly.—You must make those and out.

    The pencil moved on, then stopped. He blushed.

    I wont write that word, he said.

    What word?

    That B-word.

    What?

    Before Miss Lilly.

    I pinched his neck. You write it, I said. You hear me? Then you write this, nid big: PIGEON MY ARSE! She is WORSE THAN HIM!

    He hesitated; then bit his lip and wrote.

    Thats good. Now this. Put: Mrs Sucksby, I have escaped and am close at hand. Send me a signal by this boy. He is a friend, he is writing

    this, his name is Charles. Trust him, and believe me—oh! if this fails, Ill die!—believe me as ever as good and as faithful as your own daughter— There you must leave a space.

    He did. I took the paper from him and wrote, at the bottom, my name.

    Dont look at me! I said, as I did it; then I kissed where I had written, and folded the paper up.

    Heres what you must do , I said then. Tonight, wheleman—Mr Rivers—leaves the house, you must go over, and knock, and ask to see Mr Ibbs. Say youve got a thing to sell him. Youll know him straight off: hes tall, and trims his whiskers. Hell ask if youve been followed; and you must be sure, when he does, to say you got away . Then hell ask what brought you to him. Say you know Phil. If he asks how you know him youre to say, &quot;Through a pal named Gee.&quot; If he asks which Gee you must say, &quot;Gee Joslin, down Colliers Rents.&quot; Gee who, down where?

    Gee Joslin, down— Oh, miss! I should rather anything than this!

    Should you rather the cruel hard men, the unspeakable things, Jamaica?

    He swallowed. Gee Joslin, down Colliers Rents, he said.

    Good boy.  you hand him the watch. He will give you a price; but whatever price he gives you—if it be, a hundred pounds, or a thousand—you must say it aint enough. Say the watch is a good one, with Geneva works. Say—I dont know—say your dad doches, and you know them. Make him look a bit harder. Any luck, hell take the back off—that will give you the ce to look about. Heres who youre looking for: a lady, rather old, with hair of silver—shell be sitting in a rog-chair, perhaps with a baby in her lap. Thats Mrs Sucksby, that brought me up. Shell do anything for me. You find a way to reach her side, and pass this letter to her. You do it, Charles, and were saved. But listen here. If theres a dark-faced, mean-looking boy about, keep clear of him, hes against us. Same goes for a red-headed girl. And if that viper Miss Maud Lilly is anywhere near, you hide your face. Uand

    me?  If she sees you—more even than the boy—then we are done

    for.

    He swallowed agai the note on the bed, and sat and

    looked fearfully at it. He practised his piece. I stood at the window, and watched, and waited. First came twilight, then came dark; and with the dark came Gentleman, slipping from Mr Ibbss door with his hat at an angle and that scarlet cloth at his throat. I saw him go; gave it another half-an-hour, to be sure; then looked at Charles.

    Put your coat on, I said. Its time.

    He grew pale. I gave him his cap and his scarf, and turned up his

    collar.

    Have you got the letter? Very good. Be brave, now. No funny

    stuff. Ill be watg, dont fet.

    He did not speak. He went, and after a moment I saw him cross the street and stand before Mr Ibbss. He walked like a man on his way to the rope. He pulled his scarf a little higher about his face, then he looked round, to where he knew I stood behind the shutter.—Dont look round, you fool! I thought, when he did that. Then he plucked at his scarf again; and then he knocked. I wondered if he might run from the step. He looked as though he would like to. But before he could, the door ened, by Dainty. They spoke, and she left him waiting while she went in to Mr Ibbs; then she came back. She glanced up and dowreet. Like a fool, he glanced with her, as if to see what she looked for. Then she nodded, and stepped back. He went in, and the door was closed. I imagined her turning the latch with her  white hand. Then I waited.

    Say five minutes passed. Say ten.

    What did I suppose would happen? Perhaps, that the door would open, Mrs Sucksby e flying out, with Mr Ibbs behind her; perhaps only that shed go to her room—show a light, make a sign—I dont know. But the house stayed quiet, and when at last the door did open, there came only Charles again, with Dainty still behind him; and then again, the door was shut. Charles stood, and quivered. I was used by now to his quivers, and think I knew from the look of this ohat things were bad. I saw him look up at our

    window and think about running.—Dont you run, you fuckster! I said, and hit the glass; and perhaps he heard it, for he put down his head and came back across the street and up the stairs. By the time he reached the room his face was crimson, and slick with tears and snot.

    God help me, I dido do it! he said, bursting in. God help me, she fou and made me!

    Made you what? I said. What happened? What happened, you little tick?

    I got hold of him and shook him. He put his hands before his face.

    She got the letter off me and read it! he said. Who did?

    Miss Maud! Miss Maud!

    I looked at him in horror. She saw me, he said, and she knew me. I did it all, just as you said. I gave the watch, and the tall man took it and opes back. He thought my scarf was queer, and asked if Id the toothache. I said I did. He showed me a pair of nippers, that he said were good for drawih. I think he was teasing. The dark boy was there, burning paper. He called me a—a pigeon. The red-headed girl didnt give me a look. But the lady, your ma, was sleeping; and I tried to reach her side, but Miss Maud saw the letter in my hand. Then she looked at me, and knew me. She said, &quot;e here, boy, youve hurt your hand,&quot; and she got hold of me before the others could see. She had been playing cards at a table, and she held the letter uhe table and read it, and she twisted my fingers so hard—

    His words began to dissolve, like salt ier of his tears.

    St! I said. St for on your life, or I swear, Ill hit you! Tell me now, what did she do?

    He took a breath, and put his hand to his pocket, and brought something out.

    She did nothing, he said. But she gave me this. She took it from the table where she sat. She gave it to me, as if it might be a secret; and theall man closed the watch up and she pushed me away. He gave me a pound, and I took it, and the red-headed girl let me

    out. Miss Maud watched me go, and her eyes were like eyes on fire; but she never said a word. She only gave me this, and I think she must have meant it for you but, oh, miss! you  call me a fool, but God help me if I know what its for!

    He ha over. She had made it very small, and it took me a moment to unfold it and know what it was. When I did, I held it, and tur, then tur again; then I stood gazing stupidly at

    it.

    Just this? I said. Charles nodded.

    It laying card. It was one of the playing cards from her old French deck at Briar. It was the Two of Hearts. It had got greasy, and was marked by the folds she had put in it; but it still had that crease, in the shape of her heel, across one of its painted red pips.

    I held it, and remembered sitting with her in her parlour, springing the pack to tell her fortune. She had worn her blue gown. She had put her hand before her mouth. Now you are frightening me! she had said.

    How she must have laughed about it, later!

    Shes making game of me, I said, my voiot perfectly steady. She has sehis—youre sure theres no message on it, no mark n?—she has sehis, to tease me. Why else?

    Miss, I dont know. She took it from the table-top. She took it quick, and there was a—a wildness, about her eye.

    What sort of a wildness?

    I t say. She looked, not like herself. She wore no gloves. Her hair was curled and queer. There was a glass beside her place—I dont like to say—I think it had gin in it.

    Gin?

    We looked at each other.

    What shall we do? he asked me.

    I did not know.

    I must think, I said, beginning to walk about. I must think what shell do. Shell tell Gentleman—wont she?—and show him our letter. Then hell move, very quick, to find us. They didnt see you e back here? Someone else mightve, though. We t be sure. Weve had lu our side, so far; now our lucks turning. Oh,

    if only Id aken that womans wedding-gown!—I k would make a bad fortune. Lucks like the tide: it turns, thes faster and t be stopped.

    Dont say it! cried Charles. He was wringing his hands. Send the lady her gown back, t you?

    You t cheat luck like that. The best you  do is, try and outface it. Outface it?

    I went to the window again, and gazed at the house. Mrs Sucksby is in there now, I said. Wont one word from me do it? When did I ever let myself be frightened by John Vroom? Dainty I think wont harm me; nor Mr Ibbs. And Maud sounds muddled by gin. Charles, Ive been a fool to wait at all. Give me my knife. We are going over.

    He stood, open-mouthed, and did nothing. I got the knife myself, then took him by his wrist and led him from the room, down the slippery staircase. A man and a girl stood at the bottom, quarrelling; but their voices faded and they turheir heads to watch us as we went by. Perhaps they saw my knife. I had o hide it. The street was blowing about with gusts of grit and paper, the night still hot. My head was bare. Anyone who saw me now would know me for Susan Trinder; but it was too late to care. I ran with Charles to Mr Ibbss door, knocked on it, the him oep while I stood aside with my back to the wall. The door ened after a minute, just an inch.

    Youve e too late. It was Daintys voice. Mr Ibbs says— Oh! Its you again. What now? ged your mind?

    The door ened a little further. Charles stood, and licked his mouth, his eyes on Daintys. Then he looked at me; and when she saw him do that, she put out her head and also looked. Then she screamed.

    Mrs Sucksby! I cried. I made a charge at the door, and Dainty went flying. I caught Charless arm and pulled him into the shop. Mrs Sucksby! I shouted again. I ran to the hanging baize curtain and k back. The passage beyond was dark, and I stumbled, and Charles stumbled with me. Then I reached the door at the end,

    and threw it open. There came heat, and smoke, and light, that made me wink. I saw Mr Ibbs first. He had e half-way to the door, hearing all the shouting. When he saw me he stopped, and flung up his hands. Behind him was John Vroom, in his dog-skin coat; behind John Vroom—I saw her, and could have cried like a girl—was Mrs Sucksby. At the table, in Mrs Sucksbys great chair, was Maud.

    Beh the chair was Charley Wag. He had begun to bark at the otion. Now, seeing me, he barked more wildly a his tail, then came and rose up before me to give me his paws. The row was awful. Mr Ibbs reached forward and seized his collar and quickly jerked it back. He jerked so hard, Charley was almost throttled. I flinched away and lifted my arms. The others all watched me. If they had not seen my knife before, they saw it now. Mrs Sucksby opened her mouth. She said,

    Sue, I— Sue—

    Then Dainty came running in behind me, from Mr Ibbss shop.

    Where is she? she cried. She had made her hands into fists. She pushed Charles aside, saw me, and stamped. Youve got some cheek, ing.back here. You bitch! You have just about broke Mrs Sucksbys heart!

    Keep off me, I said, waving my knife. She looked at it in ast..onishment, then fell back. I wished she hadnt; for there was something awful about it. She was only Dainty, after all. The knife began to shake.

    Mrs Sucksby, I said, turning to her. They have told you lies. I hey had me—him and her—locked up! And it has taken me all this time—all this time, since May!—to get back to you.

    Mrs Sucksby had her hand at her heart. She looked so surprised and afraid, it might have been her I ointing the k. She looked at Mr Ibbs, and then she looked at Maud. Then she seemed to e to herself. She took two or three nimble steps across the kit and put her arms about me, tight.

    Dear girl, she said.

    She pressed my face against her bosom. Something hard struck my cheek. It was Mauds diamond brooch.

    Oh! I cried, when I felt it. And I struggled away. She has taken you from me, with jewels! With jewels and lies!

    Dear girl, said Mrs Sucksby again.

    But I looked<cite></cite> at Maud. She had not flinched, or started, at sight of me, as the others all had; she had only—just like Mrs Sucksby— lifted her hand to her heart. She was dressed like a girl of the Bh, but her face ut back from the light, her eyes in shadow—she looked handsome and proud. Her hand was trembling, though.

    Thats right, I said, when I saw that. You shake.

    She swallowed. You had much better not have e here, Sue, she said. You had much better have stayed away

    You  say so! I cried. Her voice was clear, and sweet. I remembered hearing it, now, in my dreams at the madhouse. You  say so, you cheat, you snake, you viper!

    Girl-fight! cried John, with a clap of his hands.

    Hey! hey! said Mr Ibbs. He had taken out a handkerchief and was wiping his brow. He looked at Mrs Sucksby. She still had her arms about me, and I could not see her face. But I felt her grip grow slack as she reached to take the knife from my hands. Why, hes a sharp one, aint he? she said, with a nervous laugh. She put the knife gently oable. I leaned and snatched it up again.

    Dont leave it, I said, where she might get it! Oh, Mrs Sucksby, you dont know what a devil she is!

    Sue, listen to me, said Maud.

    Dear girl, said Mrs Sucksby again, over her words. This is so astonishingly queer. This is so— Only look at you! Like a regular— ha, ha!—soldier. She wiped her mouth. What say you sit down, now, and be nice? What say we send Miss Lilly upstairs, if looking at her upsets you? Eh? And theres John and Dainty: lets ask them, shall we?—she jerked her head—to slip upstairs, too?

    Dohem go! I cried, as Dainty began to move. Not her, not them! I waved the knife. You, John Vroom, stay, I said. And then, to Mrs Sucksby and Mr Ibbs: Theyll gentleman! Dont trust them!

    Shes lost her mind, said John, rising from his chair. I made a swipe at the sleeve of his coat.

    I said, stay! I cried.

    He looked at Mrs Sucksby. She looked at Mr Ibbs.

    Sit down, son, Mr Ibbs said quietly. John sat. I o Charles.

    Charles, stand behind me, by the door to the shop. Keep them from running to it, should they try

    He had taken off his cap, and was biting the band of it. He went to the door, his face so pale, in the shadows, it seemed to glow.

    John looked at him and laughed.

    You leave him alone, I said at once. He has been a friend to me, more ever than you were. Mrs Sucksby, I should never have got back to you, without him. I should never have got free of—of the madhouse.

    She put her fio her cheek. Helped you so far as that, did he? she said, with her eyes on Charles. She smiled. Then hes a dear boy; and we shall be sure to pay him out. Shant we, Mr Ibbs?

    Mr Ibbs said nothing. Maud leaned from her chair.

    You must go, Charles, she said, in her clear, low voice. You must go from here. She looked at me. The look was strange. You must both go, befentleman es back.

    I curled my lip at her. Gentleman, I said. Gentleman. You have learned Bh habits very quick.

    The blood rose in her cheek. I am ged, she murmured. I am not what I was.

    You are not, I said.

    She lowered her eyes. She looked at her hands. And then, as if seeing that they were bare—and as if one could cover the bareness of the other—she put them awkwardly together. There came the faint jingle of metal: she had, upon her wrist, two or three thin silver bangles, of a kind I had used to like to wear. She held them, to make them be still; then lifted her head again and caught my gaze. I said, in a hard, steady voice:

    Was being a lady not enough for you, that you must e to the Bh and take the things that were ours?

    She did not answer.

    Well? I said.

    She began to try to draw free the baake them, she said. I dont want them!

    You think / want them?

    Mrs Sucksby stepped forward, her own hands darting towards Mauds.

    Let them stay! she cried.

    Her voice was hoarse. She looked at me, then gave an awkward sort of laugh. Dear girl, she said, moving back, whats silver, in this house? Whats silver, pared with the joy of seeing your face? She put one hand to her throat, and leaned with the other upon the back of a chair. She leaned heavily, and the chair-legs grated on the floor. Dainty, she said, fetch me out a tumbler of brandy, will you? This turn of thingsve quite undone me.

    Like Mr Ibbs, she took out a handkerchief and passed it over her face. Dainty gave her her drink, and she sipped it, and sat.

    e beside me, she said to me. Put down that old knife, wont you? And then, when I hesitated: What, afraid of Miss Lilly? With me and Mr Ibbs—and your own pal Charles—to mind you? e, sit.

    I looked again at Maud. I had thought her a viper, but, in the bringing and p of the brandy the lamp had got moved about, and I saw in the light of it how slight and pale and tired she was. At Mrs Sucksbys cry, she had fallen still; her hands still shook, however, and she rested her head against the high back of her chair, as if the weight of it hurt her. Her face was damp. A few strands of hair g to it. Her eyes were darker than they ought to have been, and seemed to glitter.

    I sat, and put the knife before me. Mrs Sucksby took my hand. I said,

    I have been done very wrong, Mrs Sucksby.

    Mrs Sucksby slowly shook her head. My dear, I begin to see it, she said.

    God knows what lies theyve told you! The truth is, she was in it with him from the start. They set me up, betweeo take her place; and they put me in the madhouse, where everyone supposed me to be her—

    John whistled. Double-cross, he said. Nice work but—oh! He laughed. You pigeon!

    Which is what I had known, all along, he would say; though now, it did not seem to matter. Mrs Sucksby looked, not at me, but at our joined hands. She was smoothihumb upon mine. I thought the news had stunned her.

    A bad business, she said quietly.

    Worse than that! I cried. Oh, much, much worse! A madhouse, Mrs Sucksby! With hat hurt and starved me! I was hit oime, so hard—! I was dropped—I was dropped in a bath—!

    She drew free her hand and raised it before her face.

    No more, dear girl! No more. I t bear to hear it.

    Did they torture you, with tongs? asked John. Did they put you in a strait-coat?

    They put me in a tartan gown, and boots of—

    Of iron?

    I hesitated, then gla Charles.

    Boots without laces, I said. They thought that, if they gave me laces, I should hang myself. And my hair—

    Did they cut it? said Dainty, sitting, putting a hand before her mouth. Her mouth had a fading bruise beside it—from John, I suppose. Did they shave it off?

    I hesitated again, then said, They sewed it to my head.

    Her eyes filled with tears. Oh, Sue! she said. I swear, I never meant it when I called you a bitch just now!

    Thats all right, I said. You werent to know. I turned again to Mrs Sucksby, and touched the skirt of my dress. This gown I stole, I said. And these shoes. And I walked, nearly all the way to London. My only thought was to get back here to you. For worse than all the cruel things that were doo me in the madhouse was the thought of the lies that Gentleman must have told you, about where I had gone. I supposed at first, he would have said that I had died.

    She took my hand again. He might, she said, have thought of it.

    But I knew you would ask for my body.

    Wouldnt I! Straight off!

    Then I guessed what he would say. He would say I had cut with the money, and cheated you all.

    He did, said John. He sucked his tooth. I always said that you hadnt the nerve.

    I looked into Mrs Sucksbys face. But I knew you wouldnt believe it, I said, of your own daughter. Her grip on my hand grew tight. I knew you would look for me, until you found me.

    Dear girl, I— Oh, I should have got you, too, in another month more!—only, you know, I kept my searg quiet from John and Dainty

    Did you, Mrs Sucksby? said Dainty.

    My dear, I did. I sent out a man, fidentially

    She wiped her lips. She looked at Maud. But Maud had her eyes upon me. I suppose the lamp that lit her face also lit mine, for she said, softly and suddenly,

    You look ill, Sue.

    It was the third time she had spoken my name. I heard it and— despite myself—I thought of the other times she had said it, so softly as that, a myself colour.

    You do look done up, said Dainty. You look like you aint slept in a week.

    I havent, I said.

    Then why, said Mrs Sucksby, making to rise, wont you go upstairs nout your head down? And then tomorrow, me and Dainty will e and fix you up in one of your old gowns, and dress your hair—

    Dont go to sleep here, Sue! said Maud, leaning from her chair and putting her hand towards me. Theres danger here.

    I took up my knife again, and she drew her hand back. I said,

    You think I dont know danger? You think that, in looking at you, Im not seeing danger with a face—a false face, with an actress mouth—with lying blushes, and two brown treacherous eyes?

    The words were like ker on my tohey were awful, but I must spit them out or swallow them and choke. She held my gaze, and her eyes did not seem treacherous, at all. I turhe khe

    blade took up the light of the lamp a it darting across her cheek.

    I came here to kill you, I said.

    Mrs Sucksby shifted in her seat. Maud kept her glittering gaze on mine.

    You came to Briar, she said, to do that. . .

    Then I looked away ahe knife fall. I felt suddenly tired, and sick. I felt all the walking I had done, and all the careful watg. Now nothing was as I had thought it would be. I turo Mrs Sucksby.

    you sit, I said, and hear her tease me?  you know the wicked trick she played me, and have her here, and not want to throttle her? I meant it; a sounded like bluster, too. I looked around the room. Mr Ibbs,  you? I said. Dainty, shouldnt you like to shake her to pieces, in my behalf?

    Shouldnt I! said Dainty. She showed her fist. Cheat my best pal, would you? she said to Maud. Lock her up in a madhouse and sew up her hair? Maud said nothing, but slightly turned her head. Dainty shook her fist again, the sink. She caught my eye. Seems an awful shame, though, Sue. Miss Lilly turning out to be such a sport, and all. And brave? I done her ears last week, and she never cried once. And then, she has took to taking stitches out, that natural—

    All right, Dainty, said Mrs Sucksby quickly.

    I looked again at Maud—at her  ear which, I now saw, had a crystal drop falling from it on a wire of gold; and at the curls in her fair hair; and at her dark eye-brows. They had been tweezered into two fine arches. Above her chair—I had not seen this before, either, but it seemed all of a piece with the drops, the curls and arches, the bangles on her wrist—above her chair there was hanging, from a beam, a little cage of wicker with a yellow bird in it.

    I felt tears rise into my throat.

    You have takehing that was mine, I said. You have taken it, and made it better.

    I took it, she answered, because it was yours. Because I must!

    Why must you? Why?

    She opened her mouth to speak. Then she looked at Mrs Sucksby and her face ged.

    For villainys sake, she said flatly. For villainys sake. Because you were right, before: my face is a false one, my mouth is an actress mouth, my blushes tell lies, my eyes— My eyes— She looked away. Her voice had begun to rise. She made it flat again. Richard found that, after all, we must wait for our money, lohahought.

    She took up her glass in both her hands, and swallowed what was left in it.

    You havent got the money?

    She put the glass back down. Not yet.

    Thats something, then, I said. I shall want a share of that. I shall want half of it. Mrs Sucksby, do you hear? They shall give me half their fortu least. Not a stinking three thousand, but a half. Think what we shall do, with that!

    But I did not want the money; and when I spoke, my voice sounded hateful to me. Mrs Sucksby said nothing. Maud said,

    You shall have what you like. I will give you anything, anything at all—if you will only go from here, now, before Richard es back.

    Go from here? Because you tell me to? This is my home! Mrs Sucksby— Mrs Sucksby, will you tell her?

    Mrs Sucksby again passed a hand across her mouth.

    There again, Susie, she said slowly, Miss Lilly might be right. If there is the moo be thought of, you might do well, for now, to keep out of Gentlemans way. Let me speak with him, first. Ill give him a taste of my temper, though!

    She said it in a queer, half-hearted way, with a try at a smile—as she might have said it, I thought, if she had just found out that Gentleman had swindled her out of two or three shillings at cards. I guessed she was thinking about Mauds fortune, and how it might be cut. I couldnt help but wish that, after all, the money was nothing to her. I said,

    Will you make me go? The words came out like a whisper. I looked away from her, about the kit—at the old Dutch clo the shelf, and the pictures on the walls. On the floor by the door to

    the stairs was the white a chamber-pot, with the dark eye in it, from my own room, that must have been brought down to be washed and then fotten. I would not have fotten it. Oable beh my hand was a heart: I had scratched it into the wood, the summer before. I had been like a child still, then. I had been like an infant— I looked about me again. Why were there no babies? The kit was still. Everyone was still, and watg me.

    Will you make me go, I said again to Mrs Sucksby, a her stay? Now my voice was broken as a boys. Will you trust them, not to send Dr Christie to me? Will you— Will you take her gowns, will you take the pins from her head, will you kiss her, will you let her sleep beside you in my old place, while I lie in a bed with—with red hairs in it?

    Sleep beside me? said Mrs Sucksby quickly. Who told you that?

    Red hairs?said John.

    But Maud had lifted her head, her gaze grown sharp. You have watched us! she said. And then, when she had thought it through: At the shutter!

    Ive watched you, I answered, more strongly. Ive watched you, you spider! taking everything of mine. You would rather do that— God damn you!—than sleep with your own husband!

    Sleep with—with Richard? She looked astounded. You dont suppose—?

    Susie, said Mrs Sucksby, putting her hand upon me.

    Sue, said Maud at the same time, leaning across the table and also reag for me. You dont suppose him anything to me? You dont think him a husband to me, in anything but name? Dont you know I hate him? Dont you know I hated him, at Briar?

    Will you make out now, I said, in a kind of trembling s, that you only did what you did because he made you?

    He did make me!—But, not in the way you mean.

    I said, Will you pretend, that you arent a swindling cheat?

    She said, Will you?

    And again, she held my gaze; and again, I was almost shamed by it, and looked away. Then after a moment I said, more quietly,

    I hated it. I didnt smile, with him, when your back was turned.

    You think I did?

    Why not? You are an actress.-You are ag now!

    Am I?

    She said it, still with her eyes on my face, still with her hand reag for mi falling short of taking it. The light was all upon us, the rest of the kit almost dark. I looked at her fingers. They were marked with dirt, or bruised. I said,

    If you hated him, why did you do it?

    There was no other way, she said. You saw my life. I needed you, to be me.

    So you might e here, and be me!1 She did not answer. I said, We might have cheated him. If you had told me. We might have—

    What?

    Anything. Something. I dont know what. . .

    She shook her head. How much, she asked quietly, would you have given up?

    Her gaze was so dark, yet so steady and true; but I grew aware, all at onrs Sucksby—of John and Dainty, Mr Ibbs—all of them, watg, silent and curious, thinking, Whats this . . .? And in that moment, I saw into my own cowardly heart and khat I would have given up nothing for her, nothing at all; and that, soohan be shamed by her now, I would die.

    She reached again. Her fingers brushed my wrist. I took up the knife and jabbed at her hand.

    Dont touch me! I said, as I did it. I got to my feet. Dont any of you touch me! My voice was wild. Not any of you! Do you hear me? I came back here, thinking this my home; now you want to cast me out again. I hate you all! I wish I had stayed in the try!

    I looked from face to face. Dainty had begun to cry. John sat, open-mouthed and astonished. Mr Ibbs had his hand at his cheek. Maud nursed her bleeding fingers. Charles shook. Mrs Sucksby said,

    Sue, put down the knife. Cast you out? The idea! I—

    Theopped. Charley Wag had lifted his head. From Mr

    Ibbss shop there came the sound of a key, turning in a lock. Then came the kig of boots; then whistling.

    Gentleman! she said. She looked at Maud, at Mr Ibbs, at me. She got up, and leao catch at my arm. Sue, she said, as she did it. She spoke in a voice that was almost a whisper. Susie, sweetheart, will you e upstairs . . .?

    But I did not answer, only gripped the knife more firmly. Charley Wag gave a feeble bark, aleman heard him, and barked in reply. Then he whistled again, a lazy waltz tune, and we heard him stumbling along the passage and watched as he pushed at the door. I think he was drunk. His hat was crooked, his cheek quite pink, his mouth a perfect O. He stood, and slightly swayed, and looked about the room, squinting into the shadows. The whistle died. His lips grew straight, and he licked them.

    Hallo, he said, heres Charles. He wihen he looked at me, and at my knife. Hallo, heres Sue. He took off his hat and began to unwind the scarlet cloth from his throat. I supposed you might e. Had you left it another day, I should have been ready. I have just now collected a letter, from that fool Christie. He certainly dragged his heels, iing me know of your escape! I think he plao recapture you before he should have to. Bad publicity, when ones lady lunatics run.

    He put the scarlet cloth ihe hat ahem drop. He took out a cigarette.

    Youre fug cool, I said. I was shaking. Heres Mrs Sucksby and Mr Ibbs, know everything.

    He laughed. I should say they do.

    Gentleman! said Mrs Sucksby. Listen to me. Sue has told us terrible things. I want you to go.

    Do him leave! I said. Hell send for Dr Christie! I waved my knife. Charles, stop him!

    Gentleman had lit his cigarette, but apart from that had not moved. He turo look at Charles, who had taken a couple of doubtful steps towards him. He put his hand to Charless hair.

    So, Charley, he said.

    Please, sir, said Charles.

    You have fou a villain.

    Charless lip began to tremble. Hoo God, Mr Rivers, I never meant to!

    There, there, said Gentlemaroked Charless cheek. Mr Ibbs made a puffing sound with his lips. John got to his feet, then looked about him as if he did not know why he had do. He blushed.

    Sit down, John, said Mrs Sucksby.

    He folded his arms. I shall stand if I like.

    Sit down, or Ill hit you.

    Hit me? His voice was hoarse. Hit them two, there! He poio Gentleman and Charles. Mrs Sucksby took two quick steps, and struck him. She struck him hard. He put both his arms to his head and gazed at her from between his elbows.

    You old cow! he said. You been down on me sihe day I was born. You touch me again, youll know it!

    His eyes blazed as he said it; but then, they filled with tears and he began to snivel. He walked to the wall, and kicked it. Charles shuddered a harder. Gentleman looked from oo the other, then gazed at Maud iend amazement.

    Is it down to me, he said, that small boys weep?

    Fuck you, I aint small! said John.

    Will you be quiet? said Maud, in her low, clear voice. Charles, thats enough.

    Charles wiped his nose. Yes, miss.

    Gentleman leaned against the post of the door, still smoking. So, Suky, he said. You know all now.

    I know youre a filthy swindler, I said. But I khat, six months ago. I was a fool, thats all, to trust you.

    Dear girl, said Mrs Sucksby quickly, with her eyes olemans face. Dear girl, the fools were me and Mr Ibbs, to let you.

    Gentleman had taken his cigarette from his mouth to blow against its tip. Now, hearing Mrs Sucksby aing her gaze, he stood quite still for a sed with it held before his lips. Then he looked away and laughed—a disbelieving sort of laugh—and shook his head.

    Sweet Christ, he said quietly.

    I thought she had shamed him.

    All right, she said. All right. She lifted her hands. She stood, like a man on a raft—like she was afraid to make too sharp a move for fear of sinking. Now, no more wildness. John, no more sulks. Sue, put that knife down, please, I beg you. No-one is to be harmed. Mr Ibbs. Miss Lilly. Dainty. Charles—Sues pal, dear boy—sit dowlemaleman.

    Mrs Sucksby, he said.

    No-oo be harmed. All right?

    He gla me. Tell it to Sue, he said. She is looking at me with murder in her eyes. Uhe circumstances, I dont quite care for that.

    Circumstances? I said. You mean, your having locked me up in a madhouse a me to die? I should cut your bloody head off!

    He narrowed his eyes, made a face. Do you know, he said, you have a very whining too your voice at times? Has no-oold you that?

    I made a l<tt>..t>u him with the knife; but the truth was, I was still bewildered, and sick, and tired, and the lunge was a feeble one. He watched, not fling, as I stood with the point of the blade before his heart. Then I grew afraid that the knife would shake and he would see it. I put it down. I put it down oable—at the edge of the table, just beyond the circle of light that the lamp threw there.

    Now, aint that nicer? said Mrs Sucksby.

    Johns tears had dried, but his face was dark—darker on one cheek than oher, where Mrs Sucksby had hit him. He looked at Gentleman, but o me.

    She went for Miss Lilly just now, he said. Said shed e to kUl her.

    Gentleman gazed at Maud, who had bound up her bleeding fingers in a handkerchief. He said, I should like to have seen it.

    John nodded. She wants a half of your fortune.

    Does she? said Gentleman, slowly.

    John, shut up, said Mrs Sucksby. Gentleman, dont mind him.

    He is only making trouble. Sue said a half, but that was her passion talking. She aint in her right mind. She aint— She put a hand to her brow, and looked a little queerly about the room—at me, and at Maud. She pressed her fingers against her eyes. If I might only, she said, have a moment, for thinking in!

    Think away, said Gentleman easily, sourly. I am longing to know what you will e up with.

    So am I, said Mr Ibbs. He said it quietly. Gentleman caught his eye, and raised a brow.

    Sticky, wouldnt you say, sir? Too sticky, said Mr Ibbs. You think so?

    Mr Ibbs gave a nod. Gentleman said, You think perhaps I should go, make it simpler? Are you mad? I said. t you see, hell still do anything for his money? Do him go! Hell send for Dr Christie. Do him go, said Maud, to Mrs Sucksby. Dont you think of going anywhere, said Mrs Sucksby, to Gentleman.

    He shrugged, his colour rising. You wanted me to leave, two minutes ago!

    I have ged my mind. She looked at Mr Ibbs; who looked away.

    Gentleman took off his coat. Fuck me, he said, as he did it; and he laughed, not nicely. Its too warm for work like this.

    Fuck you, I said. You fug villain. You do what Mrs Sucksby says, all right?

    Like you, he answered, hanging his coat on a chair. Yes.

    He snorted. You poor little bitch.

    Richard, said Maud. She had got to her feet and was leaning upoable. She said, Listen to me. Think of all the filthy deeds youve ever dohis will be the worst, and will gain you nothing. What will? said John.

    But Gentleman snorted again. Tell me, he said to Maud, when you first started learning to be kind. Whats it to you, what Sue

    knows?—Dear me, how you blush! Not that thing, still? And do you look at Mrs Sucksby? Dont say you care what she thinks! Why, youre as bad as Sue. Look how you quake! Be bolder, Maud. Think of your mother.

    She had raised her hand to her hea_rt. Now she jumped as if he had pinched her. He saw it, and laughed again. Then he looked at Mrs Sucksby. She had also given a kind of start at his words; and she stood, with her hand, like Mauds, at her bosom, beh that diamond brooch. Then she felt him looking, glanced quickly at Maud, a her hand fall.

    Gentlemans laughter died. He stood very still.

    Whats this? he said.

    Whats what?said John.

    Now then, said Mrs Sucksby, moving. Dainty—

    Oh! said Gentleman. Oh! He watched her as she stepped about the table. Then he looked from her to Maud, in aed sort of way, his colour rising higher. He put his hand to his hair and tugged it back from his brow.

    Now I see it, he said. He laughed; then the laugh broke off. Oh, now I see it!

    You see nothing, said Maud, taking a step towards him, but glang at me. Richard, you see nothing.

    He shook his head at her. What a fool Ive been, not to have guessed it sooner! Oh, this is marvellous! How long have you known? No wonder youve kicked and cursed! No wonder youve sulked! No wonder shes let you! I always marvelled at that. Poor Maud! He laughed, properly. And, oh, Mrs Sucksby, poor you!

    Thats enough! said Mrs Sucksby. You hear me? I wont have it spoke of!

    She also took a step towards him.

    Poor you, he said again, still laughing. Then he called: Mr Ibbs, sir, did you know of this, too?

    Mr Ibbs did not answer.

    Know what? asked John, his eyes like toints. He looked at me. Know what?

    I dont know, I said.

    Know nothing, said Maud. Know nothing, nothing! She was still moving slowly forward, her eyes—that seemed almost blaow, and glittered worse than ever—all the time olemans face. I saw her put her hand upon the dark edge of the table, as if to guide herself about it. Mrs Sucksby saw it too, I think. Perhaps she also saw something else. For she started, and then spoke quickly.

    Susie, she said, I want you to go. Take your pal and go. Im not going anywhere, I said.

    No Susie, you stay, said Gentleman, in a rich sort of voice. Dont mind Mrs Sucksbys wishes. You have mihem too long. What are they to you, after all? Richard, said Maud, almost pleading.

    Gentleman, said Mrs Sucksby, her eyes still on Maud. Dear boy. Be silent, will you? I am afraid.

    Afraid? he answered. You? I should say you never knew fear, in all your life. I should say your hard old leathery heart is beating perfectly quietly now, behind your hard old leathery breast.

    At his words, Mrs Sucksbys face gave a twitch. She raised a hand to the bodice of her dress.

    Feel it! she said, moving her fingers. Feel the motion here, then tell me I aint afraid!

    Feel that? he said, with a gla her bosom. I dont think so. Then he smiled. You may get your daughter to do it, however. Shes had practice.

    I ot say for certain what came . I know that, hearing his words, I took a step towards him, meaning to strike him or make him be silent. I know that Maud and Mrs Sucksby reached him first. I do not know if Mrs Sucksby, when she darted, darted at him, or only—seeing Maud fly—at her. I know there was the gleam of something bright, the scuffle of shoes, the swish of taffeta and silk, the rushing of someones breath. I think a chair was scraped or knocked upon the floor. I know Mr Ibbs called out. Grace! Grace! he called: and even in the middle of all the fusion, I thought it a queer thing to call; until I realised it was Mrs Sucksbys first hat we never heard used.

    And so, it was Mr Ibbs I was watg, when it happened. I did wheleman began to stagger. But I heard him groan. It was a soft sort of groan.

    Have you hit me? he said. His voice was strange.

    Then I looked.

    He supposed he had only been punched. I think I supposed it, too. He had his hands at his stomad was leaning forward, as if nursing the pain of the blow. Maud stood a little before him, but now moved away; and as she did I heard something fall, though whether it fell from her hand, or from his—or from Mrs Sucksbys—I ot tell you. Mrs Sucksby was the closer to him. She was certainly the closer. She put her arm about him, and as he sagged she braced herself against his weight, and held him. Have you hit me? he said again.

    I dont know, she said.

    I dont think anyone knew. His clothes were dark, and Mrs Sucksbys gown was black, and they stood in the shadows, it was hard to see. But at last he took a hand away from his waistcoat and held it before his face; and then we saw the white of his palm made dark with blood.

    My God! he said then.

    Dainty shrieked.

    Bring a light! said Mrs Sucksby. Bring a light!

    John caught up the lamp and held it, shaking. The dark blood turned suddenly crimsolemans waistcoat and trousers were soaked with it, and Mrs Sucksbys taffeta gown was red and running where she had held him.

    I had never seen blood run so freely. I had talked, an hour before, of murdering Maud. I had sharpehe knife. I had left the knife upoable. It was not there now. I had never seen blood run, like this. I grew sick.

    No, I said. No, no!

    Mrs Sucksby gripped Gentlemans arm. Take your hand away, she said. He still clutched his stomach.

    I t.

    Take your hand away!

    She wao see how deep the wou. He grimaced, then drew off his fingers. There came, from a gash in his waistcoat, a bubble—like a bubble of soap, but swirling red—and then a spurt of blood, that fell and struck the floor with a splash—an ordinary splash, like water or soup would make.

    Dainty shrieked again. The light wobbled. Fuck! Fuck! said John.

    Set him down in a chair, said Mrs Sucksby. Fetch a cloth, for the cut. Fetething to catch this blood. Fetething, anything—

    Help me, said Gentleman. Help me. Oh, Christ!

    They moved him, awkwardly, with grunts and sighs. They sat him on a hard-backed chair. I stood and looked on, while they did it—held still, I suppose, by horror; though I am ashamed now, that I did nothing. Mr Ibbs plucked a towel from a hook on the wall and Mrs Sucksby k at Gentlemans side and held it against the wound. Each time he moved or took his hand from his stomach, the blood spurted. Fetch a bucket or a pot, she said again; and finally Dainty ran to the door, caught up the chamber-pot that had beehere, and brought it a down beside the chair. The sound of the blood striking the a—and the sight of the red of it, against the white, and against that great dark eye—was worse than anything. Gentleman heard it and grew frightened.

    Oh, Christ! he said again. Oh, Christ, Im dying! Iween the words, he moaned—a shuddering, chattering moan, that he could not help or stop. Oh, Jesus, save me!

    There now, said Mrs Sucksby, toug his face. There now. Be brave. Ive seen women lose blood like this, from a baby; and live to tell of it.

    Not like this! he said. Not like this! Im cut. How badly am I cut? Oh, Christ! I need a surgeon. Do I?

    Bring him liquor, said Mrs Sucksby, to Dainty; but he shook his head.

    No liquor. A smoke, though. In my pocket, here.

    He dipped his  to his waistcoat, and John fished in the folds and brought out a packet of cigarettes, and another of matches.

    Half of the cigarettes were soaked with blood, but he found ohat was dry, lit it at his own mouth, then put it ilemans.

    Good boy, said Gentleman, coughing. But he winced, and the cigarette fell. John caught it up in trembling fingers a back between his lips. He coughed again. More blood oozed up between his hands. Mrs Sucksby took the towel away and wrung it—wrung it as if it were filled with water. Gentleman began to shake.

    How did this happen? he <samp></samp>said. I looked at Maud. She had not moved siepping from him as he began to fall. She had kept still as me, her eyes upon his face. How  this be? He looked wildly about him—at John, at Mr Ibbs, at me. Why do you stand and watch me? Bring a doctor. Bring a surgeon!

    I think Dainty took a step. Mr Ibbs caught her arm.

    Neons here, he said firmly. No men like that, to this

    house.

    No men like that? cried Gentleman. The cigarette fell. What are you saying? Look at me! Christ! Dont you know a crooked man? Look at me! Im dying! Mrs Sucksby, you love me. Bring a man, I beg you.

    Dear boy, be still, she said, still pressing the towel to the cut. He cried out in pain and fear.

    Damn you! he said. You bitches! John—

    John put down the lamp and raised his hand to his eyes. He was weeping and trying to hide it.

    John, go for a surgeon! Johnny! Ill pay you! Fuck! The blood spurted again. Now his face was white, his whiskers black but matted, here and there, with red, his cheek gleaming like lard.

    John shook his head. I t! Dont ask me!

    Gentleman turo me. Suky! he said. Suky, theyve killed me—

    Neons, said Mr Ibbs again, when I looked at him. Bring a man like that, and were done for.

    Take him to the street, I said. t you? Call a doctor to the street.

    He is cut too bad. Look at him. It would bring them here. There is too much blood.

    There was. It now almost filled the a pot. Gentlemans moans had begun to grow fainter.

    Damn you! he said softly. He had begun to cry. Who is there wholl help me? Ive money, I swear it. Who is there? Maud?

    Her cheek was almost as pale as his, her lip quite white.

    Maud? Maud? he said.

    She shook her head. Then she said, in a whisper: I am sorry. I am sorry.

    God damn you! Help me! Oh! He coughed. There came, in the spittle at his mouth, a thread of crimson; and then, a moment later, a gush of blood. He raised a feeble hand to it—saw the fresh red upon his lingers—and his look grew wild. He reached, out of the circle of lamp-light, and began tle, as if to raise himself from the chair. He reached for Charles. Charley? he said, the blood bubbling and bursting about the word. He clutched at Charless coat and made to draw him closer. But Charles would not e. He had stood all this time in the shadows, a look of fixed and awful terror on his faow he saw the bubbles at Gentlemans lips and whiskers, Gentlemans red and slippery hand gripping the coarse blue collar of his jacket, awitched like a hare. He turned and ran. He ran, the way I had brought him—along the passage to Mr Ibbss shop. And before we could call to him o to him to make him stop, we heard him tear open the door then shriek, like a girl, into Lant Street:

    Murder! Help! Help! Murder!

    At that we all, save Mrs Sucksby and Maud, sprang back. John made for the shop.—Too late! said Mr Ibbs. Too late. He held up his hand. John stood and listehere had e a swirl of hot wind from the open shop-door and it carried with it what I thought at first was the echo of Charless cry; then the sound grew stronger, and I uood it was an answering shout, perhaps from the window of a house nearby. In a sed it was joined by ahen it was joined by this—the worst sound of all, to us—the sound of a rattle, rising and falling on the gusting wind; and drawing nearer.

    The blues! said Johurned, and came to Dainty. Dainty,

    run! he said. She stood for a sed, thehe back way__

    tearing the bolts from their cradles.—Go on! he said, when she looked back. But he did not go with her. Instead, he went to Gentlemans side.

    We might take him, he said to Mrs Sucksby. He looked at me, and then at Maud. We might take him between us, if we are quick.

    Mrs Sucksby shook her head. Gentlemans own head hung low upon his breast. The blood still bubbled at his lip; burst, and bubbled again.

    Save yourself, she said to John. Take Sue.

    But he did not go; and I knew—and know, still—that I wouldnt have followed, if he had. I was held there, as if by a charm. I looked at Mr Ibbs. He had run to the wall beside his brazier and, as I watched, he drew out one of the bricks. I only found out later that he kept mohere, privately, in an old cigarette box. He put the box inside his waistcoat. Then he began to look about him, at the a, the knives and forks, the ors on the shelves: he was looking to see what there might be, that he could be done for. He did not look at Gentleman or Mrs Sucksby. He did not look at me— once he came near me, and thrust me aside, to reach past me for a porcelain cup; and when he had got it he dashed it to the floor. When Charley Wag rose up and gave a strangled sort of bark, he kicked him.

    Meanwhile, the sound of shouts and rattles grew close. Gentleman lifted his head. There was blood on his beard, on his cheek, at the er of his eye.

    Do you hear that? he said weakly.

    Dear boy, I do, said Mrs Sucksby. She still k at his side.

    What sound is it?

    She put her red hands over his. The sound of Fortune, she said.

    She looked at me, and then at Maud. You might run.

    I said nothing. Maud shook her head. Not from this, she answered. Not now.

    You know what follows?

    She nodded. Mrs Sucksby glanced again at me, and then again at Maud, then closed her eyes. She sighed, as if weary.

    To have lost you once, dear girl, she said. And now, to lose you again—

    You shall not lose me! I cried; and her eyes flew open, and she held my gaze for a sed, as if not uanding. Then she looked at John. He had tilted his head.

    Here they e! he said.

    Mr Ibbs heard him, and ran; but he got no further than that dark little court at the back of the house before a poli picked him up and brought him back again; and by then, two more poli had made their way into the kit by the shop. They looked at Gentleman, and at the chamber-pot of blood, and—what we had not thought to look for or to hide—at the knife, which had got kicked into the shadows and had blood upon it; and they shook their heads.—As poli tend to do when they see things like that, in the Bh.

    This is nasty work, aint it? they said. This is very bad. Lets see how bad.

    They took hold of Gentlemans hair and drew back his head, a for the pulse at his neck; and then they said,

    This is filthy murder. Now, who do?

    Maud moved, or took a step. But John moved quicker.

    She do, he said, without a hesitation. His cheek was darker than ever, where he had been struck before. He lifted his arm and pointed. She do. I saw her.

    He poi Mrs Sucksby.

    I saw him, and heard him, but could not act. I only said, What—? and Maud, I think, also cried out, What—? or Wait—!

    But Mrs Sucksby rose from Gentlemans side. Her taffeta dress was soaked in his blood, the brooch of diamonds at her bosom turo a brooch of rubies. Her hands were crimson, from fiip to wrist. She looked like the picture of a murderess from one of the penny papers.

    I do, she said. Lord knows, Im sorry for it now; but I do. And these girls here are i girls, and know nothing at all about it; and have harmed no-one.

 Chapter Seventeen

    My name, in those days, was Susan Trinder. Now those days all came to an end.

    The police took every one of us, save Dainty. They took us, a us in gaol while they tore up the Lant Street kit, looking for clues, for stashes of money and poke. They kept us in separate cells, and every day they came and asked the same set of questions.

    What was the murdered man, to you?

    I said he was a friend of Mrs Sucksbys.

    Been long, at Lant Street?

    I said I was born there.

    What did you see, on the night of the crime?

    Here, however, I always stumbled. Sometimes it seemed to me that I had seen Maud take up the knife; sometimes I even seemed to remember seeing her use it. I know I saw her touch the table-top, I know I saw the glitter of the blade. I know she stepped away as Gentleman started to stagger. But Mrs Sucksby had been there,

    too, she had moved as quick as anyone; and sometimes I thought it was her hand I remembered seeing dart and flash ... At last I told the simple truth: that I did not know what I had seen. It didnt matter, anyway. They had John Vrooms word, and Mrs Sucksbys own fession. They didnt need me. On the fourth day after they took us, they let me go.

    The others they kept longer.

    Mr Ibbs was brought before the magistrate first. His trial lasted half-an-hour. He was done, after all, not on at of the poke left lying about the kit—he was too good at taking the seals and stampings off, for that—but for the sake of some of the notes in his cigarette box. They were marked ohe police, it turned out, had been watg the business at Mr Ibbss shop, for more than a month; and in the end they had got Phil—who, you might remember, had sworn hed never do aerm in gaol, at any cost—to plant the marked notes on him. Mr Ibbs was found to have haolen goods: he was sent to Pentonville. Of course, he knew many of the men in there, and might be supposed to have had an easy time among them—except that, here was a funny thing: the fingersmiths and cracksmen who had been so grateful to get ara shilling from him oside, now quite turned against him; and I think his time was very miserable. I went to visit him, a week after he went in. He saw me, and put his hands before his face, and was in general so ged and sht down, and looked at me so queerly, I could not bear it. I didnt go again.

    His sister, poor thing, was found by the poli her bed at Lant Street, while they were going through the house. We had all fotten her. She ut on the ward of a parish hospital. The move, however, was too great a shock for her; and she died.

    John Vroom could not be pio any crime, save—through his coat—to that old one of dog-stealing. He was let off with six nights in Tothill Fields, and a flogging. They say he was so disliked in his gaol, the keepers played cards for who should be the oo flog him; that they flung in one or two extras above his twelve, for fun; and that after, he cried like a baby. Dainty met him at the prison

    gate, and he punched her and blacked her eye. It was thanks to him, though, that she had got  off from Lant Street.

    I never spoke to him agaiook a room for him and Dainty in another house, a out of my way. I saw him, only once; and that was in the court-room, at Mrs Sucksbys trial.

    The trial came up very quick. I spent the nights before it at Lant Street, lying awake in my old bed; sometimes Dainty came back, to sleep beside me and keep me pany. She was the only one, out of all my old pals, who would: for of course, everyone else supposed— from the story having been put about, before—that I was a cheat. It came out that I had taken that room, in the house across from Mr Ibbss; and had lived there, in what seemed a sneaking sort of way, for almost a week. Why had I dohat? Then someone said they saw me running, on the night of the murder, with a look of wildness in my eye. They talked about my mother, and the bad blood that flowed ihey didnt say I was brave, now; they said I was bold. They said they wouldnt have been surprised if it was me that had put the knife in, after all; and Mrs Sucksby—who still loved me like a daughter, though I had turned out bad—who had stepped forward and taken the blame . . .

    When I walked out in the Bh, people cursed me. Once, a girl threw a sto me.

    At any other time it would have broken my heart. Now, I did not care. I had only ohought, and that was to see Mrs Sucksby as often as I could. They had her in the Horsemonger Lane Gaol: I spent all my days there—sitting oep outside the gate, when it was too early to be let in; talking with her keepers, or with the man who was to plead her case in court. Some pal of Mr Ibbss had found him for us; he was said to have regularly saved the worst sort of villains from the rope. But he told me, holy, that our case was a bad ohe most we  hope, he said, is that the judge show mercy, for the sake of her age.

    More than once I said, Suppose it could be proved she never did it?

    Hed shake his head. Where is the evidence? hed say. Besides, she has admitted to it. Why should she do that?

    I did not know, and could not answer. He would leave me then, at the gate of the gaol—going quickly off, stepping into the street and calling out for a cab-man; and Id watch him go with my hands at my head, for his shout, and the rattle of hooves and wheels, the movement of people, the very stones beh my feet, would seem harsh to me. Everything seemed harsh, and loud, and harder and faster than it ought to have been, just then. Many times I would stop, and remember Gentleman, gripping the wound in his stomach, looking disbelievingly at our own disbelieving faces. How did this happen? he had said. I wao say it, now, to everyone I saw: How did this happen? How  this be? Why do you only stand and watch me . . .?

    I would have writteers; if I had known how to write, and who to send them to. I would have goo the house of the man who was to be judge; if I had known how to find it. But I did nothing like that. What little fort I got, I got at Mrs Sucksbys side; and the gaol, though it was so grim—so dark, and.bleak—at least was also quiet. I got to spend more time there than I ought to have, through the kindness of the keepers: I think they thought me younger and less of a sharper than I was. Heres your daughter, theyd say, unlog the gate to Mrs Sucksbys cell; and every time, she would quickly lift her head and study my face, lance beyond my shoulder, with a troubled look—as if, I thought, not quite believing they had let me e again a to let me stay.

    Then shed blink, and try at a smile. Dear girl. Quite alone?

    Quite alone, Id answer.

    Thats good, shed say after.a moment, taking my hand. Aint it? Just you ahats good.

    She liked to sit with my hand in hers. She did not like to talk. When at first Id weep, and curse, and beg her to take back her story, my words would so upset her I feared shed grow ill.

    No more, shed say, very pale in the fad set about the mouth. I do, thats all. I dont want to hear no more about it.

    So then Id remember that dander of hers, and keep silent, and only smooth her fingers in mihey seemed to grow thinner, every time I saw her. The keepers said she left her dinners quite

    untouched. The sight of the dwindling of those great hands upset me, more than I  say: it seemed to me that everything, that was s, would be put right if only Mrs Sucksbys hands could be made to be handsome again. I had spent what mohere was in the house at Lant Street, on finding a lawyer; but all that I could make now through borrowing or pawning I put on little dishes to try a her—on shrimps, and saveloys, and suet-puddings. Oook her a sugar mouse, thinking she might remember the time she had put me in her bed and told me about Nancy from Oliver Twist. I dont think she did, however; she only took it a distractedly aside, saying she would try it later, like she did with everything else. In the end her keepers told me to save my money. She had been passing the dishes to them.

    Many times she held my fa her hands. Many times she kissed me. Once or twice she gripped me hard, and seemed about to speak on some awful matter; but always, at the last, she would turter aside and it would be lost. If there were things I might have asked her—if I was troubled by queer ideas, and doubts—I kept quiet as she did. That time was bad enough; why make it worse? We talked instead of me—of how I should do now and iure.

    Youll keep up the old place, at Lant Street? shed say.

    Wont I! Id answer.

    You wont think of leaving?

    Leaving? Why, I mean to keep it ready, against the day they let you out. . .

    I did not tell her how very ged the house was, now that she and Mr Ibbs, and Mr Ibbss sister, had gone. I did not tell her that neighbours had left off calling; that a girl threw a sto me; that people—strangers—would e and stand, for hours at a time, at the doors and windows, hoping flimpse of the place where Gentleman had died. I did not say how hard I had worked, with Dainty, to take the blood-stain from the floor; how we had washed and washed; how many buckets of water we had carried off, crimson; how at last we had had to give it up, because the stant scrubbing began to lift the surface of the boards and turn the pale

    wood underh a horrible pink. I didnt tell her of all the places— the doors, the ceiling—and all the things—the pictures on the walls, the ors upon the mahe dinner-plates, the knives and forks—that we found marked with streaks and splashes of Gentlemans blood.

    And I did not say how, as I swept and scrubbed the kit, I ced on a thousand little reminders of my old life—dog-hairs, and chips of broken cups, bad farthings, playing cards, the cuts on the door-frame made by Mr Ibbss ko mark my height as I grew up; nor how I covered my fad wept, at every one.

    At night, if I slept, I dreamed of murder. I dreamed I killed a man, and had to walk the streets of London with his body in a bag too small to hold it. I dreamed of Gentleman. I dreamed I met him among the graves at the little red chapel at Briar and he showed me the tomb of his mother. The tomb had a lock upon it, and I had a blank and file and must cut the key to fit; and every night I would set to work, knowing I must work quickly, quickly; and every time, just as the job was almost done, some queer disaster would happen—the key would shrink row toe, the file would soften in my fingers; there would be a cut—the final cut—I could not make, never make in time . . .

    Too late, Gentleman would say.

    Oime the voice was Mauds.

    Too late.

    I looked, but could not see her.

    I had not seen her, sihe night that Gentleman died. I didnt know where she was. I khe police had kept her lohan they kept me—for she gave them her name, and it got into the neers; and, of course, Dr Christie saw it. I heard it, from the keepers at the gaol. It had all e out, how she was Gentlemans wife, and had supposedly been in a madhouse and had escaped; and how the police didnt know what to do with her—whether to let her go, or lock her up as a lunatic, or what. Dr Christie said only he could decide; so they called him in to examine her. I nearly had a fit

    when I heard that. I still couldnt go near bath-tubs. But what happened, was this: he took one look at her, was seen to stagger and grow white; then declared himself only overe with emotion, to find her so perfectly cured. He said this showed how good his methods were. He had the papers give details of his house. He got lots of neatients out of it, I think, and quite made his fortune.

    Maud herself was set at liberty, then; and after that, she seemed to vanish. I guessed she had gone bae to Briar. I know she never came to Lant Street. I supposed her too afraid!—for of course, I would have throttled her if she had.

    I did wonder if she might, however. I wo, every day. Perhaps today, I would think each m, will be the day shell e. And then, eaight: Perhaps tomorrow . . .

    But, as I have said, she never did. What came instead, was the day of the trial. It came in the middle of August. The sun had kept on blazing all through that awful summer, and the court—being packed with watchers—was close: every hour a man was called to throw water on the floor to try and cool it. I sat with Dainty. Id hoped I might sit in the box with Mrs Sucksby, and hold her hand; but the poli laughed in my face when I asked it. They made her sit alone, and wheook her in and out of the room, they put cuffs on her. She wore a grey prison gown that made her face seem almost yellow, but her silver hair shone very bright against the dark wood walls of the court. She flinched when she first came up, and saw the crowd of strahat had e to see her tried. Then she found out my face among them and grew, I thought, more easy. Her eye came baine, after that, as the day went on—though I saw her looking, too, about the court, as if in search of another. At the last, however, her gaze would always fall.

    When she spoke, her voice was weak. She said she had stabbed Gentleman in a moment of anger, m a quarrel over money he owed for the renting of her room.

    She earned her money from the letting of rooms? asked the proseg lawyer.

    Yes, she said.

    And not from the handling of stolen goods, or the unlised nursing—only known as farming—of orphaned infants?

    No.

    Then they brought io say they had seen her, at different times, with different bits of poke; and—what was worse—found women who swore they had given her babies that had very soon afterwards died . . .

    Then John Vroom spoke. They had put him in a suit like a clerks, and bed and shined his hair; he looked more like an infant than ever. He said he had seehing that took pla the Lant Street kit, oal night. He had seen Mrs Sucksby put in the knife. She had cried, You blackguard, take that! And he had seen her with the knife in her hand, for at least a minute, before she did.

    At least a mihe lawyer said. You are quite sure? You know how long a minute is? Look at that clock, there. Watch the movement of the hand ...&quot;

    We all watched it sweep. The court fell still, to do it. I never knew a minute so long. The lawyer looked back at John.

    As long as that? he said.

    John began to cry. Yes, sir, he said, through his tears.

    Then they brought the k, for him to say it was the ohe crowd broke out in murmurs when they saw it; and when John wiped his eyes and looked, and nodded, a lady swoohe knife was shown to all the men of the jury then, one by one, and the lawyer said they must be sure to note how the blade was sharpened, more than it naturally would have been for a knife of that kind— that it was the sharpening of it that made Gentlemans wound so bad. He said that broke in pieces Mrs Sucksbys story about the quarrel, by showing evidence of forethought—

    I nearly started out of my seat, when I heard that. Then I caught Mrs Sucksbys eye. She shook her head, and looked so pleadingly at me to be silent, I fell back; and it never came out that the knife was sharp not because she had sharpe, but because I had. They never called me to the stand. Mrs Sucksby would not let them. They did call Charles; but he wept so hard, and shook so

    badly, the judge declared him unfit. He was sent back to his auntys.

    No-one was told about me, and Maud. No-oioned Briar or old Mr Lilly. No-one came forward to say that Gentleman was a villain—that he had tried to rob heiresses—that he had ruined people through the selling of terfeit stock. They made out that he was a det young man with a promising future; they said that Mrs Sucksby had robbed him of it through simple greed. They even found out his family, and brought his parents to the trial—and youll never believe it, but it turned out that all his tales of being a gentlemans son were so much puff. His father and mother ran a small kind of drapers shop, in a street off the Holloway Road. His sister taught piano. His real name was not Richard Rivers or even Richard Wells; it was Frederick Bunt.

    They drew his picture in the papers. Girls all land were said to have cut it out and worn it o their hearts.

    But when I looked at that picture—and when I heard people talk of the awful murder of Mr Bunt, and of vices, and sordid trades— it seemed to me as though they must be talking of something else, something else entirely, not of Gentleman, being hurt, by mistake, in my own kit, with my own people all about. Evehe judge sent off the jury, and we waited, and watched the neermeing ready to run with the verdict as soon as it came; evehe jury, after an hour, returned, and one of them stood and gave back their answer in a single word; evehe judge covered up his horse-hair wig with a cloth of black, and hoped that God would have merrs Sucksbys soul—even then, I did not really feel it as you would suppose I might, did not believe, I think, that so many dark and sentlemen speaking so many grave and monotonous words could pinch out the spirit and the heat and the colour from the lives of people like me and Mrs Sucksby.

    Then I looked at her face; and saw the spirit a and colour half-gone from it, already. She was looking dully about her, at the murmuring crowd—looking for me, I thought, and I rose, and lifted my hand. But she caught my eye, and her gaze, as it had before, moved on: I watched it roam about the room, as if looking for

    someone or something else—finally it settled and seemed to clear, and I followed it and picked out, at the back of the rows of watchers, a girl dressed all in black, with a veil, that she was just putting down— It was Maud. I saw her, not expeg to see her: and Ill tell you this, my heart flew open; then I remembered everything, and my heart flew shut. She looked miserable—that was something, I thought. She was sitting alone. She made no sort of sign—to me, I mean; and o Mrs Sucksby.

    Then our lawyer called me to him, to shake my hand and say he was sorry. Dainty was weeping and needed my arm to help her walk. When I looked at Mrs Sucksby again, her head was sunk upon her breast; and when I looked for Maud, she had gone.

    The week that passed after that I remember, now, as not a week at all, but as a single great endless day. It was a day without sleep—for how could I sleep, when sleep might take away thoughts of Mrs Sucksby, who was so soon to die? It was a day, almost, without darkness—for they kept lights in her cell, that burned all through the night; and in the hours I could not be with her, I kept lights burning at Lant Street—every light I could find in the house, and every light I could borrow. I sat alone, with blazing eyes. I sat and watched, as though she might be ill at my side. I hardly ate. I hardly ged my clothes. When I walked, it was to walk quickly to Horsemonger Lao be with her; or to walk slowly back, havi her there.

    They had her now, of course, in the ned cell, and one or other of a pair of matrons was always with her. They were kind enough, I suppose; but they were great stout women, like the  Dr Christies, and they wore similar vas aprons, and carried keys: I would catch their eyes and flinch, and all my old bruises would seem to start up ag. Then again, I could never quite find it in my heart to like them, on their own ats—for surely, if they were truly worth liking, they would open the door a Mrs Sucksby go? Ihey were keepihere, for men to e and hang her.

    I tried not to think of that, however—or rather, like before, I

    found I could not think of it, could not believe it. How much Mrs Sucksby brooded upon it, I t say. I know they sent the prison chaplain to her and she spent some hours with him; but she old me what he said to her, or if it brought her any fort. Now more than ever, she seemed to like not to speak at all, only to feel the gentle holding of my hand in hers; though now more thaoo, her gaze as she looked at me would seem sometimes to grow cloudy, and she would colour, and struggle as if with the awful burden of things unsaid . . .

    But she said only ohing to me, that she meant for me to remember; and that was on the day before her last—the final time I ever saw her. I went to her, with my heart almost breaking, and thought I should find her pag her cell or plug at the bars on her window—in fact, she was calm. It was me who wept, and she sat in her prison chair a me kneel with my head in her lap, and she put her fio my hair—taking the pins from it aing it fall, until it lay across her knee. I had not had the heart to curl it. It seemed to me that I should never have heart enough, ever again.

    How shall I do, Mrs Sucksby, without you? I said.

    I felt some tremor pass through her. Theer, dear girl, she whispered, than with me.

    No!

    She nodded. Better, by far.

    How  you say it? When, if I had stayed with you—if I had never goh Gentleman to Briar— Oh, I should never have left your side!

    I hid my fa the folds of her skirt, a again.

    Hush, now, she said. She stroked my head. Hush, now . . . Her gown was rough upon my cheek, the prison chair hard against my side. But I sat a her soothe me, as though I might be a child; and at last we both fell silent. There was a little window, high in the wall of her cell, that let in two or three strips of sunlight: we watched them creep across the stone flags of the floor. I never knew light could creep like that. It crept, like fingers. And when it had crept almost from one wall to another, I heard a step, thehe

    matroo lay her hand upon my shoulder.—Its time, she murmured. Say yood-byes, now. All right?

    We stood. I looked at Mrs Sucksby. Her gaze was clear still, but her cheek, in a moment, had ged—was grey, and damp, like clay. She began to tremble.

    Dear Sue, she said, you have been good to me— She drew me to her, and put her mouth against my ear. It was cold as the mouth on a corpse, already; but twitched, like it might have been palsied. Dear girl— she began, in a broken whisper. I almost drew back. Dont say it! I thought.—Though I do not know if I could have said what it was I wished she would not say; I only knew I was suddenly afraid. Dont say it! She gripped me tighter. Dear girl— Then the whisper grew fierce. Watch me, tomorrow, she said. Watch me. Dont cover your eyes. And then, if you should ever hear hard things of me when I am gohink back—

    I will! I said. I said it, half in terror, half in relief. I will!— Those were my last words to her. Theron I suppose must have touched me again; must have led me, stumbling, into the passage beyond the gate.—I dont recall. What I remember  is passing through the prison yard, feeling the sun e upon my fad giving a cry, turning away—thinking, how queer and wrong and awful it was, that the sun should shiill shine, even now, even there . . .

    There came a keepers voice. I heard the rumble of it, but not the words. He was asking something of the matron at my side. She nodded.

    One of em, she said, with a gla me. The other came this m

    I only wondered later what she meant. For now, I was too dazed and miserable to wonder anything. I walked, in a sort of trance, back to Lant Street—only keeping, as much as I could, to the shadows, out of the blazing sun. At the door to Mr Ibbss shop I found boys, chalking nooses oep—they saw me e and ran off, shrieking. I was used to that, however, ahem run; but kicked the nooses away. Inside, I stood a mio get my breath, and to look about me—at the locksmiths ter, streaked with dust; and

    the tools and key-blanks, that had lost their shine; and the hanging baize curtain, that had got torn from its loops and was drooping. When I walked through to the kit, my footsteps ched: for sometime—I couldnt say when—the brazier had been knocked from its stand, and coals and ders still lay scattered on<q>99ｌｉｂ?</q> the floor. It seemed too ordinary a thing to do, to sweep them up, set the brazier right; and anyway, the floor was ruined—broken and gaping, from where the police had torn up boards. Underh it seemed dark, till yht a light: then you could see earth, two feet belo earth, with bones and oyster shells in it, ales and wriggling worms.

    The table had been pushed to the er of the room. I went and sat at it, in Mrs Sucksbys old chair. Charley Wag lay beh it—poor Charley Wag, he had not barked since Mr Ibbs had jerked so hard on his collar: he saw me now, a his tail, and came a me tug his ears; but then he slunk away and lay with his head on his paws.

    I sat, as still and quiet as him, for almost an hour; then Dainty came. She had brought us a supper. I didnt want it, aher did she; but she had stolen a purse to buy it, and so I got out bowls and spoons ae it slowly, in silence, looking all the time, as we did, at the clock—the old Dutch clo the mahat we knew was steadily tig, tig away the last few hours of Mrs Sucksbys life ... I meant to feel them, if I. could. I meant to feel each minute, each sed. Wont you let me stay? said Dainty, when it came time for her to go. It dont seem right, you being here all on your own. But I said that that was how I wa; and finally she kissed my cheek a; and then it was just me and Charley Wag again, and the house, growing dark about us. I lit more lights. I thought of Mrs Sucksby, in her bright cell. I thought of her, in all the ways I had seen her, not there, but here, in her own kit: dosing babies, sipping tea, lifting up her faight kiss it. I thought of her carvi, wiping her mouth, and yawning . . . The clock ticked on—quicker, and louder, it seemed to me, than it had ever ticked before. I put my head upoable, upon my arms. How tired I was! I closed my eyes. I could not help it. I meant to keep awake; but I closed my eyes, and slept.

    I slept, for once, without dreaming; and I was woken by a curious sound: the tramping and scuffing of feet, and the rising and falling of voices, ireet outside. I thought, in my half-sleep: It must be a holiday today, there must be a fair. What day is it?—Then I opened my eyes. The dles I had lit had buro puddles of wax, and their flames were like so many ghosts; but the sight of them made me remember where I was. It was seven oclo the m. Mrs Sucksby was going to be hanged in three hours time. The people I could hear were on their way to Horsemonger Lao get their places for watg. They had e down Lant Street first, for a look at the house.

    There came more of them, as the m went on. Was it here? I could hear them say. And then: Heres the very identical spot. They say the blood ran so fast and so hard, the walls were painted in it.—They say the murdered chap called out against heaven.—They say the woman stifled babies.—They say hed bilked her of rent.—Puts you into a creep, dont it?— Serves him right.—They say—

    They would e, and stop a minute, and then pass on; some found their way to the back of the house and rattled the kit door, stood at the window and tried to see through the ks in the shutters; but I kept everything locked and fast. I dont know if they knew I was inside. Now and then a boy would call: Let us in! A shilling, if youll show us the room! and, Hoo! hoo! Im the ghost of the feller as was stabbed, e back to haunt you!—but I think they did it to tease their friends, not to tease me. I hated to hear them, though; and Charley oor thing, kept close at my side, and shivered and started and tried to bark, with every call and rattle.—At last I took him upstairs, where the sounds were fainter. But then, after a while the sounds grew faiill; and that was worse, for it meant that the people had all passed on, found their spots for watg from, and it was almost time. I left Charley then, and climbed the  set of stairs alone—climbed them slowly, like a girl with limbs of lead; then stood at the attic door, afraid to go in. There was the bed I had been born in. There was the wash-stand, the bit of oil-cloth tacked to the wall. The last time I had e here,

    Gentleman had been alive and drunk and dang with Dainty and John, downstairs. I had stood at the window, put my thumb to the glass, made the frost turn to dirty water. Mrs Sucksby had e and stroked my hair ... I went to the window, now. I went, and looked, and almost swooned away, for the streets of the Bh, that had been dark ay then, were bright, and filled with people—so many people!—people standing in the road, stopping the traffid besides them, people on walls, on sills, ging to posts and trees and eys. Some were holding children up, some were ing for a better view. Most had their hands across their eyes, to keep the sun off. All had their faces turned one way.

    They were looking at the roof of the gate of the gaol. The scaffold ,the rope already on it. A man was walking about, examining the drop.

    I saw him do it, feeling almost calm, feeling almost sick. I remembered what Mrs Sucksby had asked, with her last words to me: that I should watch her. I had said I would. I had thought I should bear it. It seemed such a little thing to bear, pared with what she must suffer . . . Now the man had taken the rope in his hands and was testing the length of it. The people in the crowd stretched their necks further, so they might see. I began to be afraid. Still I thought, however, that I would watch, to the end. Still I said to myself, I will. I will. She did it for my own mother; Ill do it for her. What else  I do for her now, except this?

    But I said it; and then came the slow, steady striking of ten oclock. The man at the rope stood down, the door to the prison steps was throwhe chaplain showed himself upon the roof, and then the first of the keepers.—I couldnt do it. I put my back to the window and covered my face with my hands.

    I knew what followed, then, from the sounds that rose up from the streets. The people had fallen silent at the striking of the clock, the ing of the chaplain; now I heard them all start up with hisses and with hoots—that, I knew, was for the hangman. I heard the very spreading of the sound about the crowd, like oil on water. When the hoots grew louder, I khe hangman had made some sign or bow. Then, in an instant, the sound turned again, moved

    faster, like a shiver, like a thrill, through the streets: the cry was sent out: Hats off!, and was mixed with bursts of dreadful laughter. Mrs Sucksby must have e. They were trying to see her. I grew sicker than ever, imagining all those strangers eyes straining out of their sockets to see what figure she would make, yet not being able to look, myself; but I could not, I could not. I could not turn, or tear the sweating hands from before my face. I could only listen. I heard the laughter ge to murmurs and calls for hush: that meant the chaplain was saying prayers. The hush went on, and on. My owbeats seemed to fill it. Then the Amen was said; and even while the word was still travelling about the streets, other parts of the crowd—the parts that were he gaol and could see best— broke out in an uneasy sort of murmur. The murmur grew lot taken up by every throat—then turo something more like a moan, roan . . . And I khat meant that they had led her up to the scaffold; that they were tying her hands, and c up her face, and putting, about her neck, the noose . . .

    And then, and then, there came a moment—just a single moment, less time than it takes to say it—of perfect, awful stillness: of the stopping of babies cries, the holding of breaths, the clapping of hands to hearts and open mouths, the slowing of blood, the shrinking back of thought: This ot be, this will not be, they wont, they t— And, , too soon, too quick, the rattle of the drop, the shrieks, as it fell—the groaning gasp, when the rope found its length, as if the crowd had a siomad a giant hand had pu.

    Now I did open my eyes, just for a sed. I opehem, and turned, and saw—not Mrs Sucksby, not Mrs Sucksby at all, but what might have been a dangling tailors figure, done up to look like a woman, in a corset and a gown, but with lifeless arms, and a drooping head like a bag of vas stuffed with straw—-

    I moved away. I did not weep. I went to the bed and lay upon it. The sounds ged again, as people found their breaths and voices—unstopped their mouths, unloosed their babies, shuffled and danced about. There came more hoots, more cries, more dreadful laughter; and finally, cheers. I think I had used to cheer myself,

    at other hangings. I hought what the cheeri. Now I listened as those hurrahs went up, and it seemed to me, even in my grief, that I uood. Shes dead, they might as well have been calling. The thought was rising, quicker than blood, in every heart. Shes dead—and were alive.

    Dainty came again that night, t me another supper. We did any of it. We only wept together, and talked of what we had seen. She had watched with Phil and some other of Mr Ibbss nephews, from a spot close to the gaol. John had said only pigeons watched from there. He knew a man with a roof, he said; a off to climb it. I wondered if he had watched at all; but didnt say that to Dainty. She herself had seehing, except the final drop. Phil, who had seehat, said the fall was a  one. He thought it was true, after all, eople said, about how the hangman put the knot, when it came to dropping women. Everyone agreed, anyway, that Mrs Sucksby had held herself very boldly, and died very game.

    I remembered that dangling tailors figure, gripped tight in its corset and gown; and I wondered how, if she had shuddered and kicked, we ever should have known it.

    But that was something not to be thought on. There were other things to see to, now. I had bee an orphan again; and as orphans everywhere must, I began, iwo or three weeks that followed, to look about me, with a sinki; to uand that the world was hard and dark, and I must make my own way through it, quite alone. I had no mohe rent on the shop and house had fallen due in August: a man had e and banged on the door, and only gone because Dainty bared her arms and said she would hit him. He had left us alone sihen. I think the house had got known as a murder-house, and no-one wao take it. But I khey would, in time. I khe man would e bae day, with other men, and break in the door. Where would I live, then? How should I do, on my own? I might, I supposed, take a regular job, at a dairy, a dyers, a furriers— The very thought of it, however, made

    me want to be sick. Everybody in my world khat regular work was only another name for being robbed and dying of boredom. I should rather stay crooked. Dainty said she khree girls who worked, in a gang, as street-thieves, Woolwich-way, and wanted a fourth . . . But she said it, not quite catg my eye; for we both khat street-thieving retty poor lay, pared to what I was used to.

    But it was all I had; and I thought it might as well do. I hadnt the heart for finding out anythier. I hadnt the heart or the spirit for anything at all. Bit by bit, everything that was left at Lant Street had gone—been pawned, or sold. I still wore the pale print dress I had robbed from the woman in the try!—and now it looked worse ohan ever, for I had grown thin at Dr Christies, and then thiill. Dainty said I had got so sharp, if you could have found a way of threadih cotton, you could have sewn with me.

    And so, when I packed the bits of stuff I wao take with me to Woolwich, there was almost nothing. And when I thought of the people I ought to call on, to say good-bye to, I could not think of ahere was only ohing I knew I must do, before I went; and that was the pig up of Mrs Sucksbys things, from Horsemonger Lane.

    I took Dainty with me. I did not think that I could bear it all alone. We went, one day iember—more than a month after the trial. London had ged, sihen. The season had turned, and the days grown cooler at last. The streets were filled with dust and straw, and curling leaves. The gaol seemed darker and bleaker than ever. But the porter there knew me, a me through. He looked at me, I thought, in pity. So did the matrons. They had Mrs Sucksbys things made ready for me, in a aper parcel tied with strings. Released, to Daughter, they said, as they wrote in a book; and they made me put my here, underh.—I could write my name quick as anyone now, since my time at Dr Christies . . . Then they led me back, across the yards, through the grey prison ground where I knew Mrs Sucksby was buried, with no stone upon her grave, so no-one could e and mourn her; and

    they took me out uhe gate, with its low, flat roof, where I had last seen the scaffold raised. They passed uhat roof every day of their lives, it was nothing to them. When they came to say goodbye, they made to take my hand. I could not give it.

    The parcel was light. I carried it home, however, in a sort of dread; and the dread seemed to make it heavy. By the time I reached Lant Street, I was almost staggering: I went quickly with it to the kit table, a down, and caught my breath and rubbed my arms. What I was dreading was having to open it and look at all her things. I thought of what must be inside: her shoes; her stogs, perhaps still in the shape of her toes and heels; her petticoats; her b, perhaps with some of her hair in it— Dont do it! I thought. Leave it! Hide it! Open it some other time, not today, not now—.

    I sat, and looked at Dainty.

    Dainty, I said, I dont think I .

    She put her hand over mine.

    I think you ought to, she said. For me and my sister was the same, whe our mothers bits back from the mue. And we left that packet in a drawer, and wouldnt look at it for nearly a year; and when Judy ope up the gown was rotted through, and the shoes and bo perished almost to nothing, from having gone so long with river-water on them. And then, we had nothing to remember Mother by, at all; save a little  she always wore.— Which Pa pawned, in the end, fin-money . . .

    I saw her lip begin to quiver. I could not face her tears.

    All right, I said. All right. Ill do it.

    My hands were still shaking though, and when I drew the parcel to me and tried to undo its strings, I found the matrons had tied them too tight. So then Dainty tried. She couldnt undo them either. We need a knife, I said, or a pair of scissors . . . But there was a time, after Gentleman died, when I hadnt been able to look at any kind of blade, without wing; and I had made Dainty take them all away, there wasnt a single sharp thing—except me—in the whole of the house. I tugged and picked at the knots again, but now I was more nervous than ever, and my hands had got damp. At last,

    I lifted the parcel to my mouth and took hold of the knots with my teeth: and finally the strings unravelled and the paper sprang out of its folds. I started back. Mrs Sucksbys shoes, her petticoats and b came tumbling out upoable-top, looking just as I had feared. And across them, dark and spreading, like tar, came her old black taffeta gown.

    I had not thought of that. Why hadnt I? It was the very worst thing of all. It looked like Mrs Sucksby herself was lying there, in some sort of swoon. The gown still had Mauds brooch pio its breast. Someone had prised the diamonds out—I didnt care about that—but the silver claws that were left had blood in them, brown blood, so dried it was almost powder. The taffeta itself was stiff. The blood had made it rusty. The rust was traced about with lines of white: the lawyers had shown the gown in court, and had drawn around each stain with chalk.

    They seemed to me like marks on Mrs Sucksbys own body.

    Oh, Dainty, I said, I t bear it! Fetch me a cloth, and water, will you? Oh! How horrible it looks—! I began to rub. Dainty rubbed, too. We rubbed in the same grim, shuddering way that we had scrubbed the kit floor. The cloths grew muddy. Our breaths came quick. We worked first at the skirt. Then I caught up the collar, drew the bodie and began to work on that.

    And, as I did, the gown made a curious sound—a creaking, or rustling, sound.

    Dainty put down her cloth. Whats that? she said. I did not know. I drew the dress closer, and the sound came again.

    Is it a moth? said Dainty. Is it flapping about, inside?

    I shook my head. I dont think so. It sounds like a paper. Perhaps the matrons have put something there

    But when I lifted the dress and shook it, and looked ihere was nothing, nothing at all. The rustling came again, however, as I laid the gown back down. It seemed to me that it came from part of the bodice—from that part of the front of the bodice that would have lain just below Mrs Sucksbys heart. I put my hand to it, a about. The taffeta there was stiff—stiff not just from the staining of Gentlemans blood, but from something else, something that

    had got stuck, or been put, behind it, between it and the satin lining of the gown. What was it? I could not tell, from feeling. So then I turhe bodiside-out, and looked at the seam. The seam en: the satin was loose, but had been hemmed so as not to fray. It made a sort of pocket, in the gown. I looked at Dainty; then put in my hand. It rustled again, and she drew back.

    Are you sure it aint a moth? Or a bat?

    But what it was, was a letter. Mrs Sucksby had had it hidden there—how long? I could not guess. I thought at first that she must have put it there for me—that she had written it, in gaol—that it was a message for me to find, after they had hanged her.—The thought made me nervous. But then, the letter was marked with Gentlemans bloo<big></big>d; and so must have lain ihe gown sihe night he died, at least. Then again, it seemed to me that it must have lain there a good deal lohan that: for as I looked more closely at it I saw how old it was. The creases were soft. The ink was faded. The paper was curved, from where Mrs Sucksbys taffeta bodice had held it, tight, against her stays. The seal—

    I looked at Dainty. The seal was unbroken. Unbroken! I said. How is that? Why should she have carried a letter, so close, so carefully, so long—a not read it? I tur in my hands. I gazed again at the dire. Whose name is there? I said.  you see?

    Dainty looked, then shook her head. t you? she said. But I could not. Hand-writing was harder even upon my eye, than print; and this hand was small, and sloped, and—as I have said—artly smeared and spotted with awful stains, I went to the lamp, ahe letter close to the wick. I screwed up my eyes. I looked and looked . . . And it seemed to me at last that if any name was written there, upon the folded paper, it was my own.—I was sure I could make out an S, and thehat followed it; and then, again, an s—

    I grew nervous again. What is it? said Dainty, seeing my face.

    I dont know. I think the letters for me.

    She put her hand to her mouth. And then: From your own mother! she said.

    My mother?

    Who else? Oh, Sue, you got to open it.

    I dont know.

    But say it tells you— Say it tells you where treasure is! Say its a map!

    I didnt think it . I felt my stomach growing sour with fear. I looked again at the letter, at the S, and the u— You open it, I said. Dainty licked her lips, then took it, slowly tur, and slowly broke the seal. The room was so quiet, I think I heard the tumbling of the slivers of wax from the paper to the floor. She unfolded the page; then frowned. Just words, she said.

    I went to her side. I saw lines of ink—close, small, baffling. The harder I gazed, the more baffling they grew. And though I had got so nervous and afraid—so sure that the letter was meant for me, yet held the key to some awful, secret thing I should far rather never know—still, to have it open before me, not being able to uand what it said, was worse than anything.

    e on, I said to Dainty. I got her her bo, and found mine. e out to the street, and well find someoo read it for us.

    We went the back way. I would not ask anyone I knew—anyone who had cursed me. I wanted a stranger. So we went north—went fast, towards the breweries up by the river. There was a man there on a er. He had a tray on a string about his neck, full of nutmeg-graters and thimbles. But he wore eye-glasses and had—I dont know what—an intelligent look.

    I said,Hell do.

    He saw us ing and gave us a nod. Want a grater, girls?

    I shook my head. Listen here, I said—or tried to say, for the walk and my own feeling and fear had taken the breath quite from me. I put my hand to my heart. Do you read? I asked him at last.

    He said, Read?

    Letters, in ladies hands? Not books, I mean.

    Then he saw the paper I held, pushed the glasses further up his nose, and tilted his head.

    -anyo

    To be opened, he read, on the eighteenth birthday— I shht through when I heard that. He did not notice. Instead, he straightened his head, and sniffed. Not in my line, he said. Not worth my while to stand here and read out letters. That aint a-going to make the thimbles fly, is it. . .?

    Some people will charge you for taking a punch. I put my shaking hand in my pocket and brought out all it held. Dainty did the same.

    Sevenpence, I said, when I had put the s together. He turhem over. Are they good? Good enough, I said.

    He sniffed again. All right. He took them, and hid them. Then he unhooked his glasses from about his ears, and gave them a rub. Now thes see, he said. You hold it up, though. Looks legal, this does. I been stung by the law, before. I might not want it to e out later, as how I touched it. . . He put his glasses ba, and got ready to read.

    All the words that are there, I said, as he did. Every one. Do you hear?

    He nodded, and began. To be opened on the eighteenth birthday of my daughter, Susan Lilly—

    I put the paper down. Susan Trinder, I said. Susan Trinder, you mean. You are reading it wrong.

    Susan Lilly, it says, he answered. Hold it up, now, and turn it. Whats the point, I said, if you aint going to read whats there . . .?

    But my voice had got thin. There seemed to have e, about my heart, a s was coiling, tight.

    e on, he said. His look had ged. This is iing, this is. What is it? A will, is it, or a testament? The last statement— there you are—of Marianne Lilly, made at Lant Street, Southwark, on this day 18th of September 1844, in the presenrs Grace Sucksby, of— He stopped. His face had ged again. Grace Sucksby? he said, in a shocked sort of voice. What, the murderess? This is stiff stuff, aint it?

    I did not answer. He looked again at the paper—at the stains.

    Perhaps he had supposed them ink, before, or paint. Now he said, I dont know as I should ...&quot; Then he must have seen my face. All right, all right, he said. Lets see. Whats here? He drew it closer. 7, Marianne Lilly, of—what is it? Bear House? Briar House?—of Briar House, Bughamshire— /, Marianne Lilly, being sound in mind though feeble in body, hereby it my own infant daughter SUSAN— Now, will you shake it about? Thats better—hereby it—hmm, hmm—to the guardianship race Sucksby; and desire that she be raised by her in ignorance of her true birth. Which birth is to be made known to her on the day of her eighteenth birthday, 3rd August 1862; on which day I do also desire that there be made over to her one half of my private fortune.

    In exge for which, Grace Sucksby its into my care her own dear daughter MAUD— Bless me, if you aint doing it again! Hold it nice, t you?—dear daughter MAUD, and does desire that she be raised similarly ignorant of her name and birth, until the aforementioned date; on which date it is my desire that there be made over to her the remainder of my fortune.

    This paper to be a true and legally binding statement of my wishes; a tract between myself and Grace Sucksby, in defiany father and brother; which is to be reised in Law.

    Susan Lilly to know nothing of her unhappy mother, but that she strove to keep her from care.

    Maud Sucksby to be raised a gentlewoman; and to know that her mother loved her, more than her own life.—Well! He straightened up. Now tell me that wasnt worth sevenpence. Papers get hold of it, mind, I should say it would be worth a lot more.—Why, how queer you look! Aint going to faint, are you?

    I had swayed and clutched at his tray. His graters went sliding. Now take care, do! he said, in a peevish way. Heres all my stock, look, going to tumble a mashed—

    Dainty came and caught me. I am sorry, I said. I am sorry.

    All right? he said, as he put the graters straight.

    Yes.

    e as a shock, has it?

    I shook my head—or perhaps I nodded, I dont remember—and

    gripped the letter, and stumbled from him. Dainty, I said. Dainty—

    She sat me down, against a wall. What is it? she said. Oh, Sue, what did it mean?

    The man still looked. I should get her water, he called.

    But I didnt want water, and I would Dainty go. I clutched her to me and put my face against her sleeve. I began to shake. I began to shake as a rusted lock must shake, wheumblers lift against their groaning springs, and the bolt is forced loose and flies. My mother— I said. I could not finish. It was too much to say— too much, even, to know! My mother, Mauds mother! I could not believe it. I thought of the picture of the handsome lady I had seen in the box at Briar. I thought of the grave that Maud had used to rub and trim. I thought of Maud, and Mrs Sucksby; and then, of Gentleman. Oh, now I see it! he had said. Now I saw it, too. Now I knew what Mrs Sucksby had longed but been afraid to tell me, at the gaol. If you should hear hard things of <bdi>.99liｂ?</bdi>me— Why had she kept the secret so long? Why had she lied about my mother? My mother was not a murderess, she was a lady. She was a lady with a fortuhat she meant to be split . . .

    // you should hear hard things of me, think back—

    I thought, and thought; and began to grow sick. I put the letter before my fad groahe thimble man still stood a little way off, and watched me; soon other people gathered and stood watg, too. Drunk, is she? I heard someone say. And, Got the horrors? Fallen in a fit, has she? Her pal should put a spoon in her mouth, shell swallow her tongue. I could not bear the sound of their voices, the feel of their eyes. I reached for Dainty and got to my feet; she put her arm about me and helped me stagger home. She gave me brandy to drink. She sat me at the table. Mrs Sucksbys dress still lay upon it: I took it up and held it in my two fists, and hid my fa its folds; then I gave a cry like a beast, and cast it to the floor. I spread out the letter, and looked again at the lines of ink. SUSAN LILLY ... I groaned again. Then I got to my feet and began to walk.

    Dainty, I said in a sort of pant, as I did. Dainty, she must have

    known. She must have known it, all along. She must have sehere, at Gentlemans side, knowing he meant at last to— Oh! My voice grew hoarse. She sehere, so he would leave me in that plad bring her Maud. It was only ever Maud she wanted. She kept me safe, and gave me up, so Maud, so Maud—

    But then, I grew still. I was thinking of Maud, starting up with the knife. I was thinking of Maud, lettie her. I was thinking of Maud, makihink shed hurt me, to save me knowing who had hurt me most...

    I put my hand ay mouth and burst out weeping. Dainty began to weep, too.

    What is it? she said. Oh, Sue, you look so queer! What is it?

    The worst thing of all, I said, through my tears. The worst thing of all!

    I saw it, sharp and clear as a line of lightning in a sky of black. Maud had tried to save me, and I had not known. I had wao kill her, when all the time—

    And I let her go! I said, getting up and walking about. Where is she, now?

    Wheres whoV said Dainty, almost shrieking.

    Maud!I said. Oh, Maud!

    Miss Lilly?

    Miss Sucksby, call her! Oh! I shall go mad! To think I thought she ider that had got you all in her web. To think there was oime when I stood, pinning up her hair! If I had said— If she had turned— If I had known— I would have kissed her—

    Kissed her? said Dainty.

    Kissed her! I said. Oh, Dainty, you would have kissed her, too! Anyone would! She earl, a pearl!—and now, and now Ive lost her, Ive thrown her away—!

    So I went on. Dainty tried to calm me, and could not. I would only walk and wring my hands, tear my own hair; or else I would sink to the floor and lie groaning. At last, I sank and would not rise. Dainty wept and pleaded—took up water and threw it in my face— ran dowreet to a neighbours house, for a bottle of salts; but I lay, as if dead. I had got sick. I had got si a moment, like that.

    She carried me up to my old room and put me to sleep in my own bed; when I opened my eyes again she says I looked at her and did not know her, says I fought her, wheried to take my gown, says I talked like a madwoman, of tartan, and india-rubber boots, and—most especially—of something I said she had taken, that I should die without. Where is it? she says I cried. Where is it? Oh!—She says I cried it so often, so pitifully, she brought me all my things ahem up before me, one by one; and that finally she found, in the pocket of my gown, an old kid glove, quite creased and blad bitten; and that when she held that up I took it from her a a over it as if my heart would break.

    I dont remember. I kept in a fever for nearly a week, and was after that so feeble I might as well have been in a fever still. Dainty nursed me, all that time—feediea and soups and gruels, lifting me so I might use the chamber-pot, wiping off the horrible sweat from my face. I still wept, and cursed and twisted, when I thought of Mrs Sucksby and how she had tricked me; but I wept more, when I thought of Maud. For all this time I had had as it were a sort of dam about my heart, keeping out my love: now the walls had burst, my heart was flooded, I thought I should drown . .. My love grew level, though, as I grew well again. It grew level, and calm—it seemed to me at last that I had never been so calm in all my life. Ive lost her, Id say again to Dainty; Id say it, over and over. But Id say it steadily—in a whisper, at first; then, as the days passed by and I got back my strength, in a murmur; finally, in my own voice. Ive lost her, Id say, but I mean to find her. I dont care if it takes me all my life. Ill find her out, and tell her what I know. She might have gone away. She might be oher side of the world. She might be married! I dont care. Ill find her, and tell her everything ...&quot;

    It was all I thought of. I was only waiting, to be well enough to start. And at last I thought I had waited enough. I rose from my bed, and the room—that had used to seem to tilt and turn, whenever I lifted my head—stayed still. I washed, and dressed, got the bag of things I had plao take with me to Woolwich. I took up the letter, and tu<bdi></bdi>cked it into my gown. I think Dainty thought I

    must have fallen bato my fever. Then I kissed her cheek, and my face was cool. Keep Charley Wag for me, I said. She saw how grave and ear I was, and began to cry.

    How will you do it? she said. I said I meant to start my search at Briar. But how shall you get there? How shall you pay? I said: Ill walk. When she heard that, she dried her eyes and bit her lip. Wait here, she said. She ran from the house. She was gone for twenty minutes. When she came back, she was clutg a pound. It was the pound she had put, so long ago, in the wall of the starch-works, that she had said we must use to bury her when she had died. She made me take it. I kissed her again. Shall you ever e back? she said. I said I did not know . . .

    And so I left the Bh a sed time, and made the journey down to Briar, ain. There were no fogs, this time. The train ran smooth. At Marlow, the same guard who had laughed at me when Id asked for a cab, now came to help me from the coach. He didnt remember me. He wouldnt have known me if he had. I was so thin, I thihought I was an invalid girl. e down from London to take the air, have you? he said kindly. He looked at the little bag I held. Shall you ma? And then, as he had last time: Is no-one e to meet you?

    I said I would walk. I did walk, for a mile or two. Then I stopped to rest on a stile, and a man and a girl went by, with a horse and cart, and they looked at me and must have thought I was an invalid, too: for they pulled their horse up and gave me a ride. They let me sit on the seat. The man put his coat about my shoulders.

    Going far? he said.

    I said I was going to Briar, they could drop me anywhere near Briar—

    To Briar! they said, when they heard that. But, why ever are you going there? Theres nobody there, sihe old man died. Didnt you know?

    Nobody there! I shook my head. I said I knew Mr Lilly had been ill. That he had lost the use of his hands and voice, and had to be fed off a spoon. They nodded. Pentleman! they said. He

    had lingered on in a very miserable sort of way, all summer long— in all that terrible heat. They say he stank, in the end, they said, dropping their voices. But though his he sdalous girl, that run off with a gentleman—did you know about that?—I didnt ahough she e back to nurse him, he died, a month ago; and sihen, the houseve been quite shut up.

    So Maud had e, and gone! If I had only known ... I turned my head. When I spoke, my voice had a catch. I hoped they would put it down to the jolting of the cart. I said,

    And the niece, Miss Lilly? What happened— What happeo her?

    But they only shrugged. They did not know. Some people said shed gone back to her husband. Some people said she had goo France . . .

    Planning on visiting one of the servants, were you? they said, looking at my print dress. The servantsve all gooo.—All go one, who stays to keep thieves out. Shouldnt like his job. They say the place is haunted, now.

    Here was a blow, all right. But I had expected blows, and was ready to suffer them. When they asked, Should they drive me baarlow? I said no, I would go on. I thought the servant must be Mr Way. I thought, Ill find him. Hell know me. And oh! hes seen Maud. Hell tell me where shes gone . . .

    So they put me dowhe wall to the Briar park started; and from there, I walked again. The sound of the horses hooves grew faint. The road was lonely, the day was bleak. It was only two or three oclock but the dusk seemed gathered in the shadows already, waiting to creep and rise. The wall seemed lohan when I had ridden past it in William Irap: I walked for what felt like an hour, before I saw the arch that marked the gate, and the roof of the lodge behind it. I quied my step—but then, my heart quite sank. The lodge was all shut up and dark. The gates were fastened with a  and lock, and piled about with leaves. Where the wind struck the iron bars it made a low sort of moaning sound. And when I stepped to the gates and pushed them, they creaked and creaked.

    Mr Way! I called. Mr Way! Anyone!

    My voice made a dozen black birds start out of the bushes and fly off, g. The noise was awful. I thought, Surely that will bring someone. But it didnt: the birds went g on, the wind moaned louder through the bars, I called aime; and no-one came. So then I looked at the  and lock. The  was a long o was only there, I think, to keep out cows, and boys. I was thihan a boy, however, now. I thought, Its not against the law. I used to work here. I might work here, still. . . I pushed the gates again, as far as they would go: and they made a gap just wide enough for me tle my way through.

    They fell together, at my back, with a dreadful clash. The birds started up again. Still no-one came, though.

    I gave it a mihen began to walk.

    It seemed quieter ihe walls, than it had been before— quieter, and queer. I kept to the road. The wind made the trees seem to whisper and sigh. The branches were bare. Their leaves lay thick upon the ground: they had got wet, and g to my skirt. Here and there were puddles of muddy water. Here and there were bushes, rown. The grass in the park was rown too, and parched from the summer, but beaten about with rain. It was turning to slime at its tips, and smelt peculiar. I think there were mi it. Perhaps there were rats. I heard them scurrying as I walked.

    I began to go quicker. The road ran down, then began to climb. I remembered driving along it with William Inker, in the dark. I knew what was ing: I knew where it turned, and what I would see when it did ... I k; but it still made me start, to e so suddenly upon the house again—to see it seem to rise out of the earth, so grey and grim. I stopped, on the edge of the walk of gravel. I was almost afraid. It was all so perfectly quiet and dark. The windows were shuttered. There were more black birds upon the roof. The ivy on the walls had lost its hold and was waving like hair. The great front door—that was always swollen, from the rain—bulged worse thahe porch was filled with more wet leaves. It seemed like a house not meant for people but fhosts.

    I remembered, suddenly, what the man and the girl had said, about it being haunted . . .

    That made me shiver. I looked about me—back, the way I had e; and then, across the lawns. They ran into dark and tangled woods. The paths I had used to take with Maud, had disappeared. I put back my head. The sky was grey and spitting rain. The wind still whispered and sighed irees. I shivered again. The house seemed to watch me. I thought, If I  only find Mr Way! Where  he be?—and I began to walk, around to the back of the house, to the stables and yards. I went carefully, for my steps sounded loud. But here, it was just as quiet ay as everywhere else. No dogs started barking. The stable doors were open, the horses gohe great white clock was there, but the hands—this shocked me, more than anything—the hands were stuck, the hour was wrong. The clock had not chimed, all the time I had walked: it was that, I think, that had made the silence se. Mr Way! I called—but I called it softly. It seemed wrong to call out, here. Mr Way! Mr Way!

    Then I saw, rising up from one of the eys, a sihread of smoke. That gave me heart. I went to the kit door, and tapped. No answer. I tried the handle. Locked. Then I went to the garden door—the door that I had run from, that night, with Maud. That was also locked. So then I went around to the front again. I went to a window, drew back a shutter, and looked inside. I could not see. I put my hands and my face to the glass; and the window, as I pressed, seemed to give against its bolt... I hesitated for almost a mihen the rain came, hard as hail. I gave a shove. The bolt flew from its screws and the window swung inwards. I lifted myself up on to the sill, and jumped inside.

    Then I stood, quite still. The sound of the breaking bolt must have been awful. What if Mr Way had heard it and came with a gun, supposing me a burglar? I felt like a burglar, now. I thought of my mother— My mother was never a thief, however. My mother was a lady. My mother was the lady of this great house ... I shook my head. I should never believe it. I began to walk softly about. The room was dark—the dining-room, I thought. I had never been in here before. But I had used to try and imagine Maud, as she sat,

    with her u her supper; I had used to imagihe little bites she would take at her meat... I stepped to the table. It was still set, with dlesticks, a knife and a fork, a plate of apples; but it was covered all over with dust and cobwebs, and the apples had rotted. The air was thick. Upon the floor was a broken glass—a crystal glass, with gold at the rim.

    The door was closed: I do not think it had been opened in many weeks. But still, when I turhe handle and pushed it, it moved perfectly silently. All the doors moved silently, in that house. The floor had a dusty carpet, that smothered my steps.

    So when I went, I made no sound, and might have glided—as if / were a ghost. The thought was queer. Across from me was another door: the door to the drawing-room. I had never been there, either; so now I crossed to it and looked ihat room was also dark and hung with cobwebs. There was ash spilling out from the grate. There were chairs, by the hearth, where I thought that Mr Lilly aleman must once have sat, to listen while Maud read books. There was a hard little sofa, with a lamp beside it, that I imagined had been hers. I imagined her sitting there, now. I remembered her soft voice.

    I fot to think about Mr Way, remembering that. I fot to think of my mother. What was she, to me? It was Maud I thought of. I had meant to go down to the kit. Instead I went slowly about the hall, by the swollen front door. I climbed the stairs. I wao go to her old rooms. I wao stand, where she had stood—at the window, at the glass. I wao lie upon her bed. I wao think how I had kissed her and lost her . . .

    I walked, as I have said, as a ghost might walk; and when I wept, I wept as a ghost would: silently, not minding the tears as they came falling—as though I knew I had tears enough for a hundred years, and in time would weep them all. I reached the gallery. The door to the library was there, standing part-en. The creatures head still hung beside it, with its one glass eye and poieeth. I thought of how I had put my fio it, the first time I came for Maud. I had waited outside the door, I had heard her reading.— Again, I thought of her voice. I thought so fiercely of it, it seemed

    to me at last that I could almost hear it. I could hear it as a whisper, as a murmur, iillness of the house.

    I caught my breath. The murmur stopped, then started again. It was not in my own head, I could hear it—it came, from the library ... I began to shake. Perhaps the house was haunted after all. Or perhaps, perhaps— I moved to the door and put a trembling hand to it, and pushed it open. Then I stood, and blihe room was ged. The paint had all been scraped from the windows, the finger of brass prised from the floor. The shelves were almost bare of books. A little fire burned in the grate. I pushed the door further. There was Mr Lillys old desk. Its lamp was lit.

    And in the glow of it, was Maud.

    She was sitting, writing. She had an elbow on the desk, a cheek upon her upturned hand, her fingers half-curled over her eyes. I saw her clearly, because of the light. Her brows were drawn into a frown. Her hands were bare, her sleeves put back, her fingers dark with smudges of ink. I stood and watched her write a lihe page was thick with lines already. Then she lifted the pen, and turned and tur, as if not sure what to put . Again she murmured, beh her breath. She bit her mouth.

    Then she wrote again; and then she moved to dip her pen in ajar of ink. And as she did that, she drew her fingers from her eyes, her face came up; and she saw me watg.

    She did not start. She grew perfectly still. She did not cry out. She did not say anything, at first. She only sat with her eyes on mine, a look of astonishment on her face. Then I took a step; and as I did, she got to her feet, letting the pen with the ink upon it roll across the papers and desk and drop to the floor. Her cheek had grown white. She gripped the back of her chair, as if to take her hand from it might mean to fall, or swoon. When I took aep, she gripped it harder.

    Have you e, she said, to kill me?

    She said it, in a sort of awful whisper; and I heard her, and saw that her face was white, not just from astonishment, but also from fear. The thought was terrible. I turned away, and hid my own face

    in my hands. It was still wet, from my falling tears. Now other tears came and made it wetter. Oh, Maud! I said- Oh, Maud!

    I had never spoken her o her before like that, I had only ever said miss; and even now, even here, after everything, I felt the strangeness of it. I pressed my fingers hard into my eyes. I had been thinking, a moment ago, of how I loved her. Id supposed her lost. I had meant to find her out, through years of searg. To e upon her now—so warm, so real—when I had ached and ached for her— It was too much.

    I dont— I said. I t— She did not e. She only stood, still white, still gripping the back of the chair. So then I wiped my face upon my sleeve, and spoke more steadily. There er, I said. I found a paper, hidden in Mrs Sucksbys gown . . .

    I felt the letter, stiff, in my own gown, as I spoke; but she didnt answer, and I guessed from that—and saw, by the look upon her face—that she kneaper it was I meant, and what it said. Despite myself, I had a moment of hating bier then—just a single moment; and when it passed, it left me weak. I went to the window, so I might sit upon the sill. I said, I paid sonoeoo read it to me. And then, I got sick.

    I am sorry, she said. Sue, I am sorry.

    She still did not e to me, though. I wiped my face again.

    I said, I got a lift with a man and a girl. They said your uncle died. They said there was nobody here, save Mr Way—

    Mr Way? She frowned. Mr Way is gone -

    A servant, they said.

    William Ihey must have meant. H e stays with me. And his wife y meals. Thats all.

    Only them, and you? In this great house=- I looked about me, and shivered. Dont you grhtened?

    She shrugged, gazed down at<mark></mark> her hands. Her look grew dark. What have I, she said, to be frightened of, rnow?

    There was so much to the words, and to trie way she said them, I did not a first. When I spoke again,   I spoke more quietly.

    When did you know? I said. Whendid ^ou know everything, about us, about— Did you know, at the start?0

    She shook her head. She spoke quietly, too. Not then, she said Not until Richard took me to London. Then she— She coloured, but lifted her head. Then I was told.

    Not before? I said.

    Not before.

    They tricked you, too, then.

    I should have been glad to think it, onow it was all of a piece with every bleak and terrible thing I had suffered and seen and learned, in the past nine months. For a minute, we said nothing. I let myself sink against the windout my cheek against the glass. The glass was cold. The rain fell hard, still. It struck the gravel before the house and made it . The lawn seemed bruised. Through the bare wet branches of the tangled wood I could just make out the shape of yews, and the pointed roof of the little red chapel.

    My mother is buried there, I said. I used to look at her grave, thinking nothing. I thought my mother was a murderess.

    I thought my mother was mad, she said. Instead—

    She could not say it. her could I. Not yet. But I turo look at her again, and swallowed, and said,

    You went to see her, at the gaol. I had remembered the matrons words.

    She nodded. She spoke of you, she said.

    Of me? What did she say?

    That she hoped you never khat she wished they might haen times over, before you should. That she and your mother had been wrong. That they meant to make you a onplace girl. That that was like taking a jewel, and hiding it in dust. That dust falls away

    I closed my eyes. When I looked again, she had at last e closer.

    Sue, she said.. This house is yours.

    I dont want it, I said.

    The money is yours. Half of your mothers money. All of it, if you wish. I have claimed none of it. You shall be rich.

    I dont want to be rich. I never wao.be rich. I only want—

    But I hesitated. My heart was too full. Her gaze was too close, too clear. I thought how I had seen her, last—not at the trial, but on the night that Gentleman died. Her eyes had glittered. They did not glitter now. Her hair had been curled. Now it was smooth, unpinned, she had put it bad tied it with a simple ribbon. Her hands did not tremble. They were bare, and marked, as I have said, with spots and smudges of ink. Her brow had ink upon it, too, from where she had pressed it. Her dress was dark, and long, yet fell not quite to the floor. It was silk, but faste the front. The highest hook was left undone. I saw the beating of her throat behind it. I looked away.

    Then I looked back, into her eyes.

    I only want you, I said.

    The blood spread across her face. She unjoined her hands, took aep to me and almost, almost reached. But theurned and lowered her gaze. She stood at the desk. She put her hand to the paper and pen.

    You do not know me, she said, in a queer, flat voice. You never did. There were things—

    She drew in her breath and would not go on. What things? I said. She didnt answer. I rose, a closer to her. What things?

    My uncle— she said, looking up fearfully. My uncles books— You thought me good. Didnt you? I was hat. I was— She seemed, for a moment, almost tle with herself. Then she moved agaio the shelves behind the desk, and took up a book. She held it, tight to her breast; then turned and brought it to me. She ope up in her hands. Her hands, I think, were shaking. Here, she said, as she looked across the page. Or, here. I saw her gaze settle. And then, in the same flat voice she had spoken in before, she began to read.

    How delicious, she read, was the glow upon her beauteous ned bare ivory shoulders, as I forced her on her ba the couch. How luxuriously did her snowy hillocks rise against my bosom in wild fusion—

    What? I said.

    She did not answer, did not look up; but turhat page and read from another.

    I scarcely knew what I was about; everything now was in active exertion—tongues, lips, bellies, arms, thighs, legs, bottoms, every part in voluptuous motion.

    Now my own cheek coloured. What? I said, in a whisper.

    She turned more pages, read again.

    Quickly my daring hand seized her most secret treasure, regardless of her soft plaints, which my burning kisses reduced to mere murmurs, while my fingers peed into the covered way of love—

    She stopped. Her heart was beating harder, though she had kept her voice so flat. My ow was also beating rather hard. I said—still not quite uanding:

    Your uncles books?

    She nodded.

    All, like this?

    She nodded again.

    Every one of them, like this? Are you sure?

    Quite sure.

    I took the book from her and looked at the print on the pages. It looked like any book would, to me. So I put it down, ao the shelves and picked up ahat looked the same. Then I took up another; and that had pictures. You never saictures like them. One was of twirls. I looked at Maud, and my heart seemed to shrink.

    You k all, I said. Thats the first thing I thought. You said that you knew nothing, when all the time—

    I did know nothing, she said.

    You k all! You made me kiss you. You made me want to kiss you again! When all the time, you had been ing here and—

    My voice broke off. She watched my face. I thought of the times I had e to the library door, heard the smothered rising and falling of her voice. I thought of her reading to gentlemen—to Gentleman—while I sat, eating tarts and custards with Mrs Stiles and Mr Way. I put my hand to my heart. It had shrunk so small and tight, it hurt me.

    Oh, Maud, I said. If I had only known! To think, of you— I began to cry. To think of your uncle— Oh! My hand flew to my mouth. My uhat thought was queerer than anything. Oh! I still held the book. Now I looked at it a drop as if it burned me. Oh!

    It was all I could say. Maud stood very still, her hand upon the desk. I wiped my eyes. Then I looked again at the smears of ink on her fingers.

    How  you bear it?

    She did not answer.

    To think of him, I said, that sod! Oh, stinking was too good for him! I wrung my hands. And now, to look at you and see you here, still here, with his books about you—!

    I gazed across the shelves; and wao smash them. I went to her, and reached to draw her close. But she held me off. She moved her head, in a way that at any other time I should have called proud.

    Dont pity me, she said, because of him. Hes dead. But I am still what he made me. I shall always be that. Half of the books are spoiled, or sold. But I am here. And look. You must know everything. Look how I get my living.

    She picked up a paper from the desk—the paper that I had seen her write on. The ink was still damp. I asked a friend of my uncles, once, she said, if I might write for him. He seo a home for distressed gentlewomen. She smiled, unhappily. They say that ladies dont write such things. But, I am not a lady

    I looked at her, not uanding. I looked at the paper in her hand. Then my heart missed its beat.

    You are writing books, like his! I said. She nodded, not speaking. Her face was grave. I dont know how my face seemed. I think it was burning. Books, like that! I said. I t believe it. Of all the ways I thought Id find you— And then, to find you here, all on your own in this great house—

    I am not alone, she said. I have told you: I have William Inker and his wife to care for me.

    To find you here, all on your own, writing books like that?-V

    Again, she looked almost proud. Why shouldnt I? she said.

    I did not know. It just dont seem right, I said. A girl, like you—

    Like me? There are no girls like me.

    I did not answer for a moment. I looked again at the paper in her hand. Then I said quietly,

    Is there money in it?

    She blushed. A little, she said. Enough, if I write swiftly.

    And you— You like it?

    She blushed still harder. I find I am good at it. . . She bit her lip. She was still watg my face. Do you hate me for it? she said.

    Hate you! I said. When I have fifty proper reasons for hating you, already; and only—

    Only love you, I wao say. I didnt say it, though. What  I tell you? If she could still be proud, then so, for now, could I ... I dido say it, anyway: she could read the words in my face. Her colour ged, her gaze grew clearer. She put a hand across her eyes. Her fingers left more smudges of black there. I still couldnt bear it. I quickly reached and stopped her wrist; the my thumb and began to rub at the flesh of her brow. I did it, thinking only of the ink, and her white skin; but she felt my hand and grew very still. My thumb moved slower. It moved to her cheek. Then I found I had cupped her fa my hand. She closed her eyes. Her cheek was smooth—not like a pearl, warmer than pearls. She turned her head and put her mouth against my palm. Her lips were soft. The smudge stayed black upon her brow; and after all, I thought, was only ink.

    When I kissed her, she shook. I remembered what it was, then, to make her shake by kissing her; and began to shake, too. I had been ill. I thought I might faint! We moved apart. She put her hand against her heart. She had still held the paper. Now it fluttered to the floor. I stooped and caught it up and smoothed the creases from it.

    What does it say? I said, when I had.

    She said, It is filled with all the words for how I want you . . . Look.

    She took up the lamp. The room had got darker, the rain still beat against the glass. But she led me to the fire and made me sit, and sat beside me. Her silk skirts rose in a rush, then sank. She put the lamp upon the floor, spread the paper flat; and began to show me the words she had written, one by one.

    Notes

    Many books provided historical detail and inspiration. Im particularly ied to V.A.C. Gatrells The Hanging Tree: Execution and the English People, 1770-1868 (Oxford, 1994) and Marcia Hamilcars Legally Dead: Experiences During Seven Weeks Detention in a Private Asylum (London, 1910).

    The index upon which Christopher Lilly is at work is based ohree annotated bibliographies published by Henry Spencer Ashbee uhe pseudonym Pisanus Fraxi: Index Librorum Prohibitorum: being Notes Bio- Biblio- Io- graphical and Critical, on Curious and Unon Books (London, 1877); turia Librorum Absditorum: being Notes Bio- Biblio- Io- graphical and Critical, on Curious and Unon Books (London, 1879); and a Librorum Ta: being Notes Bio- Biblio- Io- graphical and critical, on Curious and Unon Books (London, 1885). Mr Lillys statements on book-colleg echo those of Ashbee, but in all other respects he is entirely fictitious.

    All of the texts cited by Maud are real. They include: The Festival of the Passions, Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure, The Curtain Drawn Up, The Bagnio Miscellany, The Bir Bouquet, and The Lustful Turk. For publishiails of these see Ashbee, above.天涯在线书库《www.tianyabook.com》