"I give him all--all I--have. You talk as if--as if--I"d no right--to be on the earth at all."
"Well?"
"Oh, you do--you do! How--how can I give him more--than I"ve got? Oh, you think you know, but you don"t--you don"t know what I"ve gone through--you"ve never had that horrible morning--when I was to have been married--and I never expected Jeff to propose, but he did----"
"Oh, for goodness" sake, get up!" Louie cried.
"He did--one day--and I said No at first, but he caught hold of me....
And even then I was jealous about Kitty--I know I"m jealous--but he told me afterwards that I needn"t be jealous of poor Kitty because he"d only done it because he thought he couldn"t have me--I know I"m jealous--it hurts sometimes so that I can only cry and cry----"
Louie hadn"t wanted this at all. Again she cried: "Oh, get up!" but Evie continued to sob.
"And then when Jeff saw you--that night--at Billy"s--it was worse than ever, but I kept it from him. I"m not like you, Louie--it"s no good my telling myself I don"t mind--even though I knew it was all an accident it was like a knife----"
"Oh, don"t lie there like that!" Louie muttered.
"And then Miriam Levey reminded me of that thing Archie had said--but he"s dead now--and I know it was absurd, but I did think he liked you.
You"ve--such ways, you see--I expect you"ve been a governess or something in swell houses--I"ve got to learn them too, now, but Jeff says I"m really very quick at it----"
Louie was pacing the floor now, but more slowly and with downhung head. This was the very last thing she had wanted. More than ever she hated this unresisting piece of pulp; but strike again she could not; no, not with Evie"s soul as it were a naked picture for her to set her foot upon. And unless she did strike it was now quite, quite final. To take it lying down! Gladly she would have goaded her into a fresh show of resistance; contemptuously she would have told her to stand up and fight; but the child--Louie felt her to be a child, and herself a faded woman--was merely beyond all decency exposed. Louie only wanted to cover her up again as quickly as possible--her confessions, her abjectness, her appalling artlessnesses, her humiliating appeals. She was beginning to sob once more.
"Oh, don"t go on like that; do get up and pull yourself together!"
Louie snapped.
"I do love him--I haven"t anything else to give him--except my life--he could have that--you couldn"t give him more than that----"
"I could stop blubbering for him," said Louie curtly, resuming her walk.
Yes, it was final. Evie had overcome; Louie now backed out of the whole affair. If Jim liked to tell her of his own accord, well and good; it still seemed the only way out; but what was the good even then? Evie Jeffries would no more acquire love as Louie understood it than she would ever acquire the _nous_ to preside without betrayals at Jim"s table at Iddesleigh Gate. And if Evie had lost Jim, so had Louie. By her silence she was relinquishing him now. She saw his image recede, slowly, slowly, as if it had been indeed that ship of her fancy, outward bound, her own vessel already condemned for breaking up. Yes, the ship was drawing away. The eyes of her spirit tired of watching it; surely now she might turn them elsewhere; but no--there it was still, very small, leaning, no doubt, to a brisk breeze, but hardly appearing to move.... No, it was not gone even yet; that sudden anguished searching for it was but a trick of the eyes; it was still there--a speck----
And it had only needed six words: "James Herbert Jeffries killed Archie Merridew."
Suddenly Louie herself sank to the floor by Jimmy"s cot. Evie heard her sinking. She rose from the bed and ran to her. But Louie cried aloud and put up her hand.
"For G.o.d"s sake don"t touch me--go now--and say nothing."
The touch of Evie Jeffries would have been more than she could have borne.
"Mother, there _is_ a gentleman!"
It was Jimmy"s voice outside the door.
Slowly Louie rose to her feet. "Very well," she called shakily; "talk to him till I come. Please go at once," she added to Evie.
Evie began: "I"m sorry I said----"
"Oh, do you want me to strike you?"
"Can"t I--do anything--for you?"
"_Go!_"
She heard the outer door close behind Evie Jeffries. By that time her eyes were straining at a wide and empty horizon....
VII
--_a_
What followed when, after a few minutes during which Louie bathed her face in the bathroom, she entered her sitting-room again, fell mercifully flat. Any visit would have been an anti-climax; a visit now from Roy--it was Roy--was even welcome for that reason. If she must see him, best get it over.
He was sitting on a rush-seated chair with Jimmy between his knees.
Jimmy was playing with his watch. Save that the rims of his stolid porcelain-blue eyes were pinkish, as if with suppressed tears, he had not greatly changed. He wore a braided morning-coat; his silk hat, stick and gloves lay on another chair. His watch slipped from his boy"s hand and dangled by its chain as he rose. His voice carried Louie instantly back to the carpenter"s shed at Rainham Parva.
"It"s me, you see, Louie; here I am, like a bad penny, always turning up."
Louie spoke listlessly. "How are you? I"ll get you some tea."
A minute later, with a "May I come in here?" he had followed her into the kitchen. He merely got in her way, if she could be said, in her complete exhaustion, to have a way at all. She was cutting bread and b.u.t.ter.
"Louie, old girl," he said piteously over the bread-board, "why didn"t you--tell a fellow?"
Louie did not answer. Then Roy chirped up a little, as if something might now, past all discussion, be taken for granted.
"Well, this settles it," he said. "Clinches it entirely. You know what I mean."
Louie did know. "Just take the kettle off, will you?" she said.
"So you see that"s settled--clinched," said Roy, quite bustling.
"Right you are. The only question now is; how soon can you pack up."
"We"ll talk about it presently, if there"s anything to say. There isn"t, though. Will you carry the tray in?"
Jimmy ran straight to his knee again. "May I give him some jam?" said Roy; and then he added to the boy: "Oh, come, don"t mess yourself up with it like that!" Louie remembered his account of the accident with the centre-board: "Jam and all the lot!" but she did not smile.
"Rhoda will be here in a few minutes, then I"ll have a short walk with you," she said. "I"ve nothing to say, though."
Presently Rhoda did come in, and Louie put on her hat and old grey coat. They went out and walked slowly across Eelbrook Common towards Walham Green. There she told Roy that his return could make no difference whatever. "Don"t talk such stuff, Louie," he said; "sit down." They sat down on a bench on the side of the common past which the District Railway runs and talked.
The air rang with the shouts of poorly clad children at their Sat.u.r.day afternoon play; the common was a-crawl with urchins. Into Roy"s honest, statue-like eyes tears had come; none came into Louie"s. She only shook her head.
"You"re only lacerating me," she said.
"But, Louie----"
"You want to lacerate me?"