At the use of her Christian name Maggie blushed with pleasure.
"I couldn"t come," she said. "I didn"t want to until--until--until some things had settled themselves."
"Well--and they have?" asked Katherine.
"Yes--they have," said Maggie.
"What"s been the matter?" asked Katherine.
"I was worried about something, and then I was ill," said Maggie.
"And you"re not worried now?" said Katherine.
"I"m not going to give in to it, anyway," said Maggie. "As soon as I"m well, I"m off. I"ll find some work somewhere."
"I"ve got a plan," said Katherine. "It came into my head the moment I saw you sitting there. Will you come and stay with us for a little?"
That sense that Maggie had had when she saw Katherine of fate having a hand in all of this deepened now and coloured her thoughts, so that she could feel no surprise but only a curious instinct that she had been through all this scene before.
"Stay with you!" she cried. "Oh, I should love to!"
"That"s good," said Katherine. "Your aunts won"t mind, will they?"
"They can"t keep me," said Maggie. "I"m free. But they won"t want to.
Our time together is over--"
"I"ll come and fetch you to-morrow," said Katherine. "You shall stay with us until you"re quite well, and then we"ll find some work for you."
"Why are you good to me like this?" Maggie asked.
"I"m not good to you," Katherine answered, laughing. "It"s simply selfish. It will be lovely for me having you with me."
"Oh, you don"t know," said Maggie, throwing up her head.
"No, I don"t think I"ll come. I"m frightened. I"m not what you think.
I"m untidy and careless and can"t talk to strangers. Perhaps I"ll lose you altogether as a friend if I come."
"You"ll never do that," said Katherine, suddenly bending forward and kissing her. "I don"t change about people. It"s because I haven"t any imagination, Phil says."
"I shall make mistakes," Maggie said. "I"ve never been anywhere. But I don"t care. I can look after myself."
The thought of her three hundred pounds (which were no longer three hundred) encouraged her. She kissed Katherine.
"I don"t change either," she said.
She had a strange conversation with Aunt Anne that night, strange as every talk had always been because of things left unsaid. They faced one another across the fireplace like enemies who might have been lovers; there had been from the very first moment of this meeting a romantic link between them which had never been defined. They had never had it out with one another, and they were not going to have it out now; but Maggie, who was never sentimental, wondered at the strange mixture of tenderness, pity, affection, irritation and hostility that she felt.
"Aunt Anne, I"m going away to-morrow," said Maggie.
"To-morrow!" Aunt Anne looked up with her strange hostile arrogance.
"Oh no, Maggie. You"re not well yet."
"Mrs. Mark," said Maggie, "the lady I told you about, is coming in a motor to fetch me. She will take me straight to her house, and then I shall go to bed."
Aunt Anne said nothing.
"You know that it"s better for me to go," said Maggie. "We can"t live together any more after what happened. You and Aunt Elizabeth have been very very good to me, but you know now that I"m a disappointment. I haven"t ever fitted into the life here. I never shall."
"The life here is over," said Aunt Anne. "Everything is over--the house is dead. Of course you must go. If you feel anger with me now or afterwards remember that I have lost every hope or desire I ever had. I don"t want your pity. I want no one"s pity. I wanted once your affection, but I wanted it on my own terms. That was wrong. I do not want your affection any longer; you were never the girl I thought you.
You"re a strange girl, Maggie, and you will have, I am afraid, a very unhappy life."
"No, I will not," said Maggie. "I will have a happy life."
"That is for G.o.d to say," said Aunt Anne.
"No, it is not," said Maggie. "I can make my own happiness. G.o.d can"t touch it, if I don"t let Him."
"Maggie, you"re blasphemous," said Aunt Anne, but not in anger.
"I"m not," said Maggie. "When I came here first I didn"t believe in G.o.d, but now--I"m not sure. There"s something strange, which may be G.o.d for all I know. I"m going to find out. If He has the doing of everything then He"s taken away all I cared for, and I"m not going to give Him the satisfaction of seeing that it hurt; if He didn"t do it, then it doesn"t matter."
"You"ll believe in Him before you die, Maggie," said Aunt Anne. "It"s in you, and you won"t escape it. I thought it was I who was to bring you to Him, but I was going too fast. The Lord has His own time. You"ll come to Him afterwards."
"Oh," cried Maggie. "I"m so glad I"m going somewhere where it won"t be always religion, where they"ll think of something else than the Lord and His Coming. I want real life, banks and motor-cars and shops and clothes and work ..."
She stopped suddenly.
Aunt Anne was doing what Maggie had never seen her do before, even in the worst bouts of her pain--she was crying ... cold solitary lonely tears that crept slowly, reluctantly down her thin cheeks.
"I meant to do well. In everything I have done ill ... Everything has failed in my hands--"
Once again, as long before at St. Dreot"s, Maggie could do nothing.
There was a long miserable silence, then Aunt Anne got up and went away.
Next day Katherine came in a beautiful motor-car to fetch Maggie.
Maggie had packed her few things. Bound her neck next her skin was the ring with three pearls ...
She said good-bye to the house: her bedroom beneath which the motor-omnibuses clanged, the sitting-room with the family group, the pa.s.sage with the Armed Men, the dark hall with the green baize door ...
then good-bye to Aunt Elizabeth (two kisses), Aunt Anne (one kiss), Martha, Thomas the cat, the parrot ... all, everything, good-bye, good-bye, good-bye!
May I never see any of you again. Never, never, never, never! ...
She was helped into the car, rugs were wrapped round her, there was a warm cosy smell of rich leather, a little clock ticked away, a silver vase with red and blue flowers winked at her, and Katherine was there close beside her ...
Never again, never again! And yet how strange, as they turned the corner of the street down into the Strand, Maggie felt a sudden pang of regret, of pathos, of loneliness, as though she were leaving something that had loved her dearly, and leaving it without a word of friendliness.
"Poor dear!" She wanted to return, to tell it ... to tell it what? She had made her choice. She was plunging now into the other half of the world, and plunging not quite alone, because she was taking Martin with her.