← catalogue

Coquette

by Frank Swinnerton · English · Gutenberg #31005 · 527,768 chars · public domain (US)

The Project Gutenberg eBook of Coquette
    
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online
at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States,
you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located
before using this eBook.

Title: Coquette

Author: Frank Swinnerton


        
Release date: January 18, 2010 [eBook #31005]

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/31005

Credits: E-text prepared by Annie McGuire


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK COQUETTE ***


E-text prepared by Annie McGuire



COQUETTE

       *       *       *       *       *

THE NOVELS OF
FRANK SWINNERTON

  THE HAPPY FAMILY
  ON THE STAIRCASE
  THE CHASTE WIFE
  SHOPS AND HOUSES
  NOCTURNE
  SEPTEMBER
  COQUETTE


COQUETTE

FRANK SWINNERTON

       *       *       *       *       *

BY FRANK SWINNERTON

  COQUETTE
  SEPTEMBER
  SHOPS AND HOUSES
  NOCTURNE
  THE CHASTE WIFE
  ON THE STAIRCASE
  THE HAPPY FAMILY
  THE CASEMENT
  THE YOUNG IDEA
  THE MERRY HEART
  GEORGE GISSING
    _A Critical Study_
  R. L. STEVENSON
    _A Critical Study_

       *       *       *       *       *


COQUETTE

by

FRANK SWINNERTON

Author of "September," "Shops and
Houses," "Nocturne," Etc.







New York
George H. Doran Company

Copyright, 1921,
by George H. Doran Company




CONTENTS


                                                                    PAGE

  BOOK ONE

    TOBY                                                               9

  BOOK TWO

    GAGA                                                              89

  BOOK THREE

    CONSEQUENCES                                                     209




BOOK ONE: TOBY


i

It was Saturday night--a winter night in which the wind hummed through
every draughty crevice between the windows and under the doors and down
the chimneys. Outside, in the Hornsey Road, horse-omnibuses rattled by
and the shops that were still open at eleven o'clock glistened with
light. Up the road, at the butcher's just below the Plough public-house,
a small crowd lingered, turning over scraps of meat, while the butcher
himself, chanting "Lovely, lovely, lovely!" in a kind of ecstasy,
plunged again into a fresh piece of meat the attractive legend, "Oh,
mother, look! Three ha'pence a pound!" Just over the way, at the Supply
Stores, they had begun to roll down the heavy shutter, hiding the bright
windows, and leaving only a narrow doorway, through which light streamed
and made rainbow colours on the pavement outside. The noise of the
street was a racketting roar, hardly lower now than it had been all the
evening. Sally crouched at the window of the first floor flat, looking
down at the black roadway, and watching the stragglers from the Supply
Stores.

In the flat above there was the sound of one who sang, vamping an
accompaniment upon the piano and emphasising the simple time of his
carol by a dully stamped foot upon the floor. His foot--making in soft
slippers a dead "dump-dump-dump"--shook the ceiling of the Mintos'
flat. They could hear his dry voice huskily roaring, "There you are,
there you are, there you ain't--ain't--ain't." They had heard it a
thousand times, always with the familiar stamp. It was very gay. Old
Perce, as he was called, was a carver in a City restaurant. It was he
who received orders from the knowing; and in return for apparent
tit-bits he received acknowledgments in coin--twopence or threepence a
time. Therefore, when he reached home each evening, nicely cheery and
about a quarter drunk, his first act after having tea was to withdraw
from his pockets a paper bag or two--such as those supplied by banks for
the carriage of silver--which he would empty of greasy coppers. He piled
these coppers in mounds of twelve, and counted them over several times.
He then smoked his pipe, went into his front room, and played, "There
you are, there you are, there you ain't--ain't--ain't." Sally did not
remember ever having heard him sing anything else. He was singing it:
now with customary gusto. Sally thought he must be a very rich man. Old
Perce's wife, who let her practise on their piano, hinted as much. His
wages were low, she said, but in a week his tips often came to three or
four pounds. Three or four pounds! Whew! Sally's father only made
thirty-five shillings in a week, everything included. Mrs. Perce told
Sally many other things, which Sally shrewdly treasured in memory. It
was well to know these things, Sally thought: any day they might be ...
useful. For a girl not yet seventeen, Sally had a strangely abundant
sense of possible utilities. All old Perce's relatives were licensed
victuallers, she had learned; and one day he too would take a "little
'ouse" and stand behind his own bar, instead of behind the counter of a
city restaurant. Those would be days! "'Ave a trap and go outa Sunday
afternoons," Mrs. Perce said. "Oo, I wish you'd take me!" Sally cried.
"Course I will!" answered Mrs. Perce, with the greatest good-humour.
Meanwhile old Perce had money out on loan. "I'd like," thought Sally,
with considering eyes, "to have money out on loan. I will, too. One day.
Why shouldn't I?"

Sally's mother, Mrs. Minto, was yawning by the small fire in the grate.
She was a meagre little woman of about forty, tired and energetic. The
Mintos' flat, although very bare, was very clean. Even when there was
nothing to eat, there was water for scouring; and Mrs. Minto's hands
were a sort of red-grey, hard and lined, all the little folds of the
discoloured skin looking as if they had been bitten deep with acid that
made them black. Her hair was very thin, and she drew it closely back
from her forehead into a tiny knob like a bell-pull, leaving the brow
high and dry as if the tide of hair had receded. Her lids were heavy
over anxious eyes; her mouth was a bitter stroke across her face, under
the small, inquiring nose. Her breast was flat, and her body bent
through daily housework and too little care of herself, too little
personal pride.

Sally resembled her mother. She too was small and thin. Her hair was
pale brown, an insipid colour with a slight sandiness in it. Her cheeks
were faintly freckled just under the eyes, and her nose, equally small
and inquiring, had some freckles upon it too. Her eyelashes were light;
her eyes a grey with splashes of amber. She was sitting huddled up near
the window, breathing intently, looking out of it with eager, fascinated
interest. The streets were full of lures. Outside, there was something
which drew and absorbed her whole nature. The noise and the lights
intoxicated her; the darkness was even more bewilderingly full of
dangerous attractiveness. It was night, and night was the time when
thrills came, when her heart beat closely with a sense of timid
impudence, a sort of leashed daring. In darkness she brushed hands
against the hands of boys, and got into conversation with strangers, and
felt herself romantically transfigured. They couldn't see how plain she
was in the dark: she herself forgot it. In the dark she felt that she
was bolder, with nobody to observe her and carry tales to her mother.
Boys who wouldn't look at her in daylight followed her at night along
dark streets. She was getting very experienced with boys. She could look
after herself with them. Her eyes interestedly and appraisingly scanned
every male, so that she came to know a great deal about the ways of men,
although she never put her knowledge into words. She scrutinised them.
In daylight her plainness was a help in that, because they did not take
any notice of so insignificant a figure, and she absorbed every detail
of the "fellows" she met, without having to do it under their return
observation, by means of side-glances. This was a benefit, and at heart
made her bolder, more ruthless.

At this moment, watching the people come out from the little door in the
shutter of the Supply Stores, Sally ignored the silhouettes of women;
but she peered quite intensely at those of the men. Men filled her
thoughts. She was always choosing which men she liked, and which did not
interest her, and which were weak and easily exploited. Or, if she were
prevented from doing that, she could still look at them, seeing that
they were men, and not women. The noise was good, the lights were good;
but the darkness, such as there now was in the street below, in all the
diminished labour of late traffic, was best of all. She saw the last
customer at the Stores shown to the door by Mr. Beddow, the keeper of
the shop; and the narrow door in the shutters closed. The last stream of
light was abruptly cut off. The face of the Stores was black. All the
opposite side of the roadway was now black. There were no more
silhouettes.

Mr. Beddow's cheeks were very fat, and when he smiled his eyes
disappeared into slits just behind the top of his bulging cheeks. He
wore a light frizzly beard. Once Mr. Beddow had given her a little
bottle of acid-drops. All the acid-drops were gone now. She had given
some of them to May Pearcey, who worked with her. They had eaten the
remainder next day over their work, while Miss Jubb was out of the room;
and the drops had made them thirsty and had given them hot, sweet
breath. Funny she should remember it all so clearly.

May Pearcey and she were both learners at a small dressmaker's shop in a
street off Holloway Road. They used to walk together along Grove Road in
the mornings, and at dinner-time, and in the evenings. But the boys all
looked at May, who was a big girl with rosy cheeks and eyes that were
bold with many conquests. Sally only got the soppy ones. That was her
luck. Sally wondered why a good-looking boy so often had a soppy one
with him. She wasn't soppy herself. The boys thought she was; they never
looked at her. But May picked up the good-looking ones, and Sally had to
take what was left. She hated to see her boy always looking on at the
others, at May, and never at herself; she hated to know that her boy
didn't like the look of her, and that he couldn't think of anything to
say to her; and didn't take the trouble to think very hard. It made
Sally snap her teeth. One day, she reassured herself, it would be
different. One day, they'd _know_.

Slowly she stretched, with her arms high above her head and her mouth
stretched sideways in a yawn. Was mother asleep? She felt cramped and
tired, and as she turned round to the light her eyes blinked at the
contrast with the outer darkness.


ii

"Oo!" groaned Sally. "Tired!"

She yawned again, a yawn that ended in a breathless gasp. Mrs. Minto
looked across the room at her.

"D'you want any supper?" she asked.

"Wotcher got? Peaches and cream, and a glass of champagne?"

Mrs. Minto wriggled her skinny shoulders and fingered her chin.

"Don't you be saucy to me, my gel. There's a bit of dry bread on the
plate there. And half a glass of stout. You might think yourself lucky
to get _that_."

"Well, I s'pose I might. But somehow I don't. Dry bread! It's Saturday,
ain't it? What I mean, pay-day."

There was a sour glance. Mrs. Minto sighed, and looked at the clock,
frowning and wriggling her shoulders. It was a form of constant drill or
shudder that affected her.

"Yes," she said. "And your father not home. Pubs are closed. Wonder
where he is. Come on, Sally. Get your supper and get to bed. Sharp,
now."

Sally rose to her feet and walked across the room. She cut a hunk of
bread, and stood about munching it, little crumbs gathering upon her
lips. You could see how thin she was when her arm was raised. Yet she
made a few little dancing steps as she ate, and her face was not without
a comical air of mischief. She was an urchin, and she looked it. She was
unscrupulous, and a liar; but she knew a great deal for her years, and
she never shrank from knowledge, because she was athirst for it.
Knowledge which could be turned to account was her preoccupation. She
stood looking at her mother, weighing her up, and in the midst of her
daughterly contempt she had room for a little admiration also. They were
not altogether unlike; but Mrs. Minto had taken the wrong turning. She
had married a drinker, and was a slave. Well, Sally had benefited by
knowledge of that. She might marry a fool--probably would have to do so,
as the wily ones took what they could get and went off on their own; but
she would never marry so incautiously as her mother had done. Why should
she? If one generation does not react to the follies of the earlier
generation, and seek an exactly contrary evil, what becomes of progress?
Sally had her wits. She thought they would never fail her.

As she sat down near her mother, they both heard a sudden slamming of
the front door, two flights of stairs below. Their eyes flew in an
exchanged glance that held trepidation. It was probably dad, and at this
time on a Saturday night dad was usually the worse for wear. Both
listened. There was a heavy step. Then the sound of voices--a woman's
raised voice, and dad's. It was evidently a row. Sally ran to the door,
and they listened to what was passing. Down the half-lighted stairway
they could just discern two figures, faintly outlined in the wavering
flutter of gas. Obviously dad was drunk, for he was haranguing a rather
hysterical Mrs. Clancy, who stood at the foot of the stairs and shouted
after him. She said that he was drunk, that he ought not to come in at
that time of night stumbling about like an ostrich, that decent people
liked a little quiet, if he pleased. Mr. Minto said he would come in
when he chose, and in what state he preferred. He was not obliged to
consult such an indiscriminate mother as Mrs. Clancy, and he would not
do it. Far from it. Far from it. He stood for liberty. He had as good a
right to the staircase as anybody else in the house. More right, in
fact. Let her bring out Mr. Clancy if she wanted a fight.... He then
proceeded to the top of the first flight of stairs. He climbed with
difficulty, missing a stair once in a while, and breathing hard. He was
pursued by an outcry. A third voice was heard--that of Mr. Clancy. It
was directed at first entirely to the woman, and begged her to come back
into the kitchen. They could see her arm caught by Mr. Clancy, from whom
she freed herself by a blow. There was a pause. But Mrs. Clancy broke
out afresh. She was beyond control, passionately shrill, and quite
wildly resentful of what had been said and done in her despite.

"Oh dear, oh dear!" cried Mrs. Minto, with inadequate petulance. She
stepped out on to the landing, fingering her mouth. Sally tiptoed after,
hardly moved, but intensely curious. She was grinning, but nervously and
with contempt of the row. "Joe!" called Mrs. Minto. "Joe! Come upstairs.
Don't get quarrelling like that. Ought to be ashamed of yourself. Come
upstairs!" She looked over the rails at her husband, like a sparrow on a
twig. He was a flight below. "Come up here!"

There was a fresh outburst from Mrs. Clancy.

"You put your 'usband to bed, Mrs. Minto. Pore woman! Pore soul! Fancy
'aving a thing like that for a 'usband! 'Usband, indeed! A great noisy
drunkard, a great beastly elephant, boozing all his money away. Drunken
fool, stamping about...."

"You shut your mouth!" bawled dad, thickly. "You shut your mouth. See?
When I want.... You shut your bloody jaw. See?"

"Joe!" called Mrs. Minto, urgently, a mean little slip peering over the
bannisters.

"Joe!" mimicked Mrs. Clancy. "You take him to bed, Mrs. Minto. Take his
boots off. He's not safe. He's a danger, that's what he is. I shall tell
the police, Mr. Minto. It's got to come. You got to stop it. I shall
tell the police. I will, I swear it...."

Mr. Minto retorted. His retort provoked Mrs. Clancy to rebuke. The
quarrel was suddenly intensified. It became rougher. Even Sally was
excited, and her hands were clasped together. Mr. Minto lost his temper.
He became mad. A fierce brutality seized him in its unmanageable grip.
They heard him give a kind of frenzied cry of passion, saw him raise his
hands, heard a hurried scuffle at the foot of the stairs, where the
Clancys, both alarmed, drew back towards their room. And then the rattle
of an arm against a rail, a slither, a bumping, and a low thud. Dad,
overbalancing in his rage, had pitched and fallen headlong down the
stairs. Mrs. Minto and Sally set up a thin screaming. The gas flickered
and burned steadily again. A shriek came from Mrs. Clancy. It was
repeated. Mr. Minto lay quite still in a confused heap in the lower
passage.


iii

Dad was dead. It was the end of that stage in Sally's life. After the
funeral, Sally and her mother were quite without money. Everything was
so wretched and unforeseen that the two were lost in this miserable new
aspect of poverty and improvidence. For a time Mrs. Perce was good to
them, and Mrs. Clancy would have been the same if Mrs. Minto had not
stared through her as through a pane of glass. But when that was done,
and the funeral was over, they had nothing. Together they sat in their
bare room above the noisy traffic of Hornsey Road, not speaking much,
but all the time turning and turning in their heads all possible ways of
making money. In another two or three years Sally might have earned
more; but she was not now much above sixteen, and at sixteen, in the
dressmaking, one does not earn a living. And while at first they thought
that Mrs. Minto might get needlework to do, with which Sally could help,
they found this out of the question. Mrs. Minto's eyes were weak, and
she could not keep her seams straight. The machine they had was
ricketty. Sewing, for her, was impossible. For a few days she was
stunned with the new demand for which she was unprepared. She was
nerveless. It made Sally sick to watch her mother and to realise from
the vacancy which so soon appeared upon her face that memory and a kind
of futile pondering had robbed her brains of activity. With a bitter
sense of grudge against life, a tightening of lips already thin, and a
narrowing of eyes already discomfitingly merciless, Sally savagely told
herself that she had to do everything alone. It was she who must save
the situation. The arrogant grasp of this fact made a great impression
upon her mind and her character. Henceforward she no longer dreamed
about men, but was alert in her intention to make everything her tool,
and everybody. From a young girl she had been converted into an
unscrupulous taker from all. The death of her father was a blow which
had suddenly drawn together all those vague determinations which had
lain concealed. There was nothing except dangerous theft from which her
mind shrank. Looking afresh at her mother, she felt stirred by a new
impatience, and a succeeding indifferent contempt. Love had been killed,
and from now onwards she would play for her own hand. Small teeth met
with a snap. Her thin lips were drawn back. Mrs. Minto shrank from the
strange venomous snarl which she saw disfiguring Sally's face.

It was as though Sally felt trapped. Everything had been spoilt by this
unexpected happening, and Sally's unconscious helplessness revealed. It
was a blow to her vanity, a douche to her crude romanticism. She had
felt cramped and irritable before; but now she was made to realise how
little she had with which to fight against calamity and the
encroachments of others. Compared with this new danger, of starvation or
slavery, all old discomforts were shown to have been trivial, because
they had been accidents in a life which, however rough and ugly had been
at least absorbed in plans for enjoyment. Now plans for enjoyment gave
place to expedients for protection. Sally was indeed fierce and
resentful. It was with animosity that she put together the few sticks of
rubbish which remained to them and helped her mother to rearrange these
things in a single room which they had taken on the other side of
Holloway Road. No more for them the delights of Hornsey Road and three
rooms; but the confined space surrounded by these four dingy walls. What
wonder that Sally was desperate for fresh air, for escape, and ran out
of doors as soon as she could wriggle free! What wonder that she walked
quickly about the dark streets! Tears came to her eyes, and with
clenched fists she secretly whimpered in this new angry despair. Of what
avail? She was alone, and the streets were dark; and behind her lay that
one room, gloomy and wretched, with a speechless ruminating mother for
solitary welcome; and no hope ... no hope.

The roads she now so wildly trod were familiar ground to Sally. They
were all gravelled roads, upon which in the evenings boys and girls
cycled and flirted, and in which on Saturdays and after school hours
children bowled their hoops and played together. As the darkness grew,
the roads were more deserted, for the children were in bed, and the boys
and girls were not allowed out. Then appeared young men and girls of
slightly greater age and of a different class, the girls walking two by
two, the young men likewise. The young men cleared their throats, the
girls peeped and a little raised their voices, a relation was
established, and still the pairs continued to promenade, safe in
couples, and relishing the thought that they were enjoying stolen
acquaintance. Sally knew the whole thing through and through. She had
walked so with May. She had tried to talk to the boys and found them
soppy, and herself soppy, and everything soppy. She had wanted more and
more excitement, and all this strolling and holding hands in the dark,
and snatching them away, and running, and being caught, was tame to her
eager longing for greater adventure. And now she walked rapidly about
the roads, her eyes full of despair, her heart heavy, her brain active
and contemptuous. She knew her own cleverness. She knew it too well. And
it was smarting now at being proved such an ignominiously valueless
possession. She might be clever, she might have brains enough to despise
May Pearcey; but she had not the power to make a living. She must still
pinch and starve beside her mother. Trapped! Trapped!

It was a matter of weeks, this mood of indignant despair, of baffled
powerlessness in face of reality. And each night, after such a lonely
walk, in such a vehement mood, Sally would return to the miserable room
in which for the present she was to spend her life. It was at the back
of the house, on the second floor, and there was another floor above.
The room had a stained ceiling and a wallpaper that had discoloured in
streaks. The original pattern had been of small flowers on a
pseudo-primrose background. Now all was merged in a general stagnation
of Cambridge blue and coffee colour. Mrs. Minto had carefully put the
washstand beneath a patch that had been washed nearly white by splashes;
and Sally had insisted that it should stand in another part of the room.
"But that's where a washstand's stood before," wailed Mrs. Minto.
"That's _why_," explained Sally, brutally. "Put the chest-of-drawers
there. _I_ don't want to splash exactly where other people have
splashed. Not likely! The place ought to have been papered new."

When their bed and the washstand and a table and the chairs and
chest-of-drawers were in there was not much to arrange. Nor was there
room for very much, because the bed took up about a quarter of the
space. The Mintos had no pictures. They thus anticipated the best modern
taste. But the consequence was that if Sally happened to be irritable
she saw the wallpaper, and the wallpaper drove her crazy. It was a
constant exasperation to her. Her extremely good taste was beginning to
bud, and wallpaper is as vital an æsthetic test as any other. She had
not yet the power or the knowledge to dress effectively, but she was
already learning intuitively such things as harmony and colour-values.
She gave an eye to neatness and cleanliness, and knew how to riddle the
costumes of girls of her own class, beginning with May Pearcey. She also
was becoming aware of all Miss Jubb's deficiencies. Higher than her own
class she could not well go, because she never had opportunities for
seeing well-dressed women. It was so much the Minto habit to rise late
on Sundays, to sit about during the afternoon, and to go out only when
other people were generally indoors, that Sundays were wasted days.
Moreover, Sally had not in the past thought much of other girls. She had
thought only of boys. Even her new spruceness was a comparatively recent
manifestation. She was growing.

She was growing so fast that her old knowledges had been undermined. She
felt raw. She felt merely exasperated with the past, so that she desired
only to forget it. All she had seemed to know and to relish had become
insipid to Sally. She was chafing at her new position, and was
unconsciously looking round and round her, bewildered, for a new path to
follow. She could no longer take the old silly pleasure in hearing of
May's fresh conquests, which gave May such monotonous delight. She
abandoned "boys," and was rewarded for her emancipation by May's
indignant sniffs at her loss of spirit. May was driven to take a new
comrade, a girl prettier than Sally, and therefore more of a rival. So
May was equally dissatisfied with the present position. She had lost
ground, and some of her victories were invented. Nellie Cavendish had a
sharp tongue, and that helped May; but Nellie was less coarsely
confident than May, and annexed the boys by means of her demureness in
face of double meanings. May could not refrain from turning away to hide
a burst of laughter. That gave Nellie an advantage, and May secretly
longed to hunt once more with Sally. When the old times could not be
recaptured, May sneered in self-defence. The two girls did not chatter
over their work now when they were left alone. They became hostile, each
aggrieved, and both mutually contemptuous. Sally kept to her stitching,
and glowered. May thought to herself. Sally abruptly announced the
soppiness of May's continued exploits. When asked by her mother if she
were not going out with May, Sally returned the cold answer that May was
soft, and continued to walk alone, much disturbed, and privately
indignant that her mother should be so blind as to ignore the alteration
that had come about. She was lonely and wretched, spoiling for any
mischief that might offer.

Material for the use of such desperation never lacks. It arose
naturally. Toby came into her life.

Toby was a young man of about twenty years of age, who lived in the
house. She caught sight of him one night as she returned home, for he
was running down the stairs as she went up them. He was of middle
height, very dark and rather stoutly built; and he wore a cap. That was
all she noticed at their first encounter, since the stairs were dark:
that, and the fact that he did not draw to one side as they met. The
contact filled her mind with sudden interest. She thought about him as
she munched her supper, and wondered what he was really like. She
wreathed around Toby quite a host of guesses--not very deep or vivid,
but sufficiently so to make her think of him still as she undressed and
slipped into bed beside her mother. Her last thought before sleep came
was a faint enjoyment of the knowledge that a young man lived in the
same house. It was the faintest of thoughts, due solely to her
restlessness; but in the gloom she was conscious of him and of the
conviction that they would meet again upon the stairs. For that time
this was as far as speculation could carry her. Sally did not think of
herself at all--only that there was a young man, and that she should see
him again. The rest of her attention was absorbed in the endeavour to
remember all she had noticed of his appearance in that hasty meeting.
She had seen enough to be sure of recognising him again with the house
as associative background. That was all. Knowing it, she feel asleep,
and dreamed of a sudden gift of beauty and attractiveness.


iv

For several days Sally did not see the young man, and so she half forgot
him, lost him in the mixture of her more pressing preoccupations. Every
morning she rose at eight o'clock, after her mother had left the house
for her first situation, and then, breakfasting slowly, she had just
time to reach Miss Jubb's by nine. She did not like Miss Jubb, who was a
thin-faced and fussy person who always wore a grey pinafore and felt
that her untidy grey hair looked as though it might hint a sorrow rather
than betray advancing years. Miss Jubb was full of the futile vanity of
the elderly spinster, her mouth full of pins, and her head full of paper
patterns. She lived with her mother on two floors of an old house, and
one of the downstairs rooms was used on Sundays for sitting in and
during the week for trying on. The work she did never suggested
anything of the enormous pains Miss Jubb took in fitting, in fastening
pins and cutting out. She was incurably a bad dressmaker; but she gave
her clients the impression that she knew her business. This was because
she was so careful, and because they knew no better than she did what
women may and may not wear with propriety. The backs of all skirts
coming from Miss Jubb drooped lower than the fronts. Her bodices always
went wrong upon the shoulders. She was great on tucks. But she was
cheap, and she was Sybil-like in her mysterious assurance. So she
supported herself and her mother; while May and Sally did the rough
basting and all sorts of odd jobs in the room behind the parlour. Here
were the big cutting-out table, the treadled sewing machine, three or
four chairs, many fragments of material, several half-made garments,
and, upon the walls, a number of coloured prints from fashion papers. In
such surroundings Sally spent her days. She ate her lunch at twelve
o'clock, and had her tea at four. And as her fingers worked, or her feet
occasionally by special permission propelled the sewing machine, she
thought of the future and planned to get into the West End.

It was the West End that now lured her. If only she could get into the
West End all her troubles would be wiped away at once, she felt. She
could possibly make more money there; but even if she did not succeed in
that aim she would still be in the running for better work. That she
could do better work she never doubted. And she knew that as long as she
was with Miss Jubb she would never do anything at all. Some instinct
told her that. She knew it. She knew it as clearly as if she had
surveyed the future from above. It was not that she was suddenly wise;
but only that ambition had come into her consciousness. The blow she had
received by her father's death had struck deep into her character. She
had now to make something of her life, or starve. With a quick circle of
thought she imagined her mother dead. What would happen then? What
chance had she? Only vaguely did Sally glimpse the possibilities. She
knew she could not keep herself. She had one aunt--her mother's
sister--with two boy children who were both younger than Sally; but Aunt
Emmy had a rough time herself, and could hardly be a help. Sally saw
clearly enough that she had to fight alone. Very well, if she had to
fight alone she would do it, and fight hard. As she scowled, it became
evident that Sally would in this fight unscrupulously use every weapon
that she could seize. She would not shrink from anything that put
opportunity into her head. She was already hardened--a kind of hardening
on the surface, or in strata, which left curious soft places in her
nature, streaks of good and layers and patches of armour and grit and
callous cruelty. Above all, she was determined upon having money. Money
was the essential thing. Money meant safety. And safety, when starvation
threatens, becomes the one imperious if ignominious ideal. Once one has
known physical hunger, no act is inconceivable as a means of averting
the risk of a similar experience.

Thus Sally's thoughts ran, not coherently or explicitly, but in vehement
revolts and resolves. Thus she ruminated, while Miss Jubb was out of the
room or had her attention so distracted that she could not observe an
idle apprentice. When Miss Jubb came back to the room or to supervision
work had a little to be hurried, so that she might not find occasion for
complaint. For Miss Jubb had a sharp tongue, and although she took the
pins out of her mouth before she talked she showed that they had left
their influence upon her tongue, which was sharp to a fault. And there,
across the room, was the rosy-cheeked May Pearcey, so silly, so
incapable of more than momentary resentment, that she was always
forgetting that Sally and she no longer spoke, but was always trying to
encourage Sally into a return to their former relation. Sometimes Sally
would glower across at May, bitterly hating her and riddling her
plumpness and folly with the keen eye of malice. May, unconscious of the
scrutiny, would go on with her work, self-satisfied, much coarser and
more physical in her appetites than Sally, still in spite of all the
rebuffs she had received grinning about her boys and what they had said
and what they had meant....

"Oo, he is awful!" she would burst out to Sally. "The things he said. I
dint half blush."

May had enjoyed his boldness, it seemed. She told Sally what he had
said. She told her things and things in the irresistible splurge of the
silly girl whose mind is full of adolescent impurity. Well, Sally knew
all that. She knew all the things that boys said; and a few more things
she had noticed and thought for herself. She was not a prude. May didn't
know anything that Sally did not know; but she talked about it. Sally
did not talk. Her sexual knowledges, so far as they went, were as close
and searching as a small-tooth comb, and collected as much that was
undesirable. She despised May. May was a fool. She was soppy, talking
about all these things as if they were new marvels, when they were as
old as the hills and as old as the crude coquetries of boys and girls.
May was the soppiest girl in Holloway. Yet the boys liked her for her
plump face and arms and legs, and her red cheeks, and her self-conscious
laugh, and her eyes that held guilt and evil and general silliness
and vanity. The boys liked May. They did not like Sally. She was too
small and sandy; too obviously critical and contemptuous in face of
their small stock of talk, and too greedy of their poor and
pompously-displayed schemes for economical entertainment. Sally's teeth
showed like the teeth of a cat, very small and sharp, emblems of her
nature. Conceit took firmer root in her heart because of her contempt
for May and her inevitable suppressions of pain and resentment in face
of neglect, as well as her suppressions of knowledge gained by a mental
process so quick that May could never have had the smallest notion of
it. Sally became secret, and her determination was made more emphatic.
She began to study her face, and her body. One day her mother found her
naked in front of a mirror, twisting herself so that she could see the
poise of her figure. It was a pretty figure, if underdeveloped, and from
that time of thorough examination onwards Sally never had the smallest
doubt of her own attractiveness and its principal constituents. Only her
face was wrong, she felt with bitter chagrin; her face and her hair. If
her face were fatter and less freckled, and if her hair were not so
sandy and pale, she would be pretty. Really pretty. Pretty enough to
make a man go silly. Well, such things could be cured, couldn't they?
Or, if not cured, then at least improved.... That was a notion that
dwelt constantly in Sally's thoughts.


v

The point was, that she must have actual experience in rousing men. It
was not that she had determined upon marriage as a way out of her
present difficulties. At the back of her mind, perhaps, was always the
knowledge that she must get a man to work for her; but this never became
an obsession. She was simply a growing girl, hungry for experience, and
at the outset hampered by circumstance. Unless something happened to
her, Sally was doomed to poverty and suffering. Therefore, full of raw
confidence, she was determined that she should be the heroine of her own
romance. Her impulse was not to give, but to take. She did not long to
be the loving help of a good man, but was ever craftily bent upon
exploiting the weaker sides of those she met for the furtherance of her
own ends.

It was several days before she met Toby again; but she waited with a
kind of patience wholly in keeping with the rest of her nature. She
always expected to meet him upon the stairs, and never did so. In the
streets she looked for him. Nights, however, were dark and Toby
apparently elusive. But one evening she was running down the three steps
at the front door just as he arrived home. With a quick breath she
ventured a "good evening." When he answered, she was filled with a
pleasure which she would have found it hard to explain. "Evening," said
Toby, surlily, and passed on. Sally gave a small grimace, a faint jerk
of the head. That was done. A few more days passed. Still in the
darkness she saw him a third time, now as she closed the door of the
room, while Toby hurried to the floor above. By questions, she had found
out that he lived exactly over them, and that his aunt had the room next
to his, in the front of the house. This aunt she never saw, as she was
very exclusive, and did not associate at all with her neighbours. Toby's
surname she could not learn; but his aunt was called Mrs. Tapping. The
aunt had an annuity. Toby worked somewhere in the neighbourhood; and
Sally soon discovered the time of his departure and return. She knew
these so well that she could have told you to the minute when his foot
might be expected upon the stairs. If he happened to be late she could
have remarked upon it to her mother if she had been in the habit of
telling her mother anything at all.

Later, when they had been in the house about three weeks, she had a
triumph. She was going out one evening and was barely down the first
two or three stairs when she heard him running behind her. He was forced
to pull up, and, from a peep, she saw that he was still half a flight
above. Their progress from that instant coincided. They reached the
front door almost at the same time. She left it open, and as Toby came
out she turned and smiled "good evening." He replied. Sally followed
with "Beautiful, isn't it!" and then went slowly towards Tollington
Park. Would he follow? She was almost breathless, her eyes downcast, her
ears strained. He did not follow. Sally frowned. A sneer came to her
lips. Then a pensiveness succeeded, and resolve became fixed. All right;
he did not follow. He was a man. All the more worthy of her address.

Moreover, she had noticed him more clearly than ever before, because the
gas in the hall had lighted his face as she turned upon the threshold.
He was strong, and she adored strength. He was broad and muscular and
dark. He had dark eyes under heavy brows. His age she supposed to be
about twenty or slightly above. As she recollected these details Sally's
face became inscrutable. All the same, her walk had lost its savour, and
she returned home earlier than usual. How miserable it was that she had
no other girl of her own age to go about with. Boys always went in twos.
So did girls. The one gave the other courage. Yet Sally was done with
May. May was soppy. She did not, in thinking this, do anything but envy
May; but all the same she knew that Toby's solitariness matched her own.
It was an augury. She lay awake until he came home, listening to her
mother breathing; and then, in a few minutes, heard eleven o'clock
strike.


vi

The next time this happened, and they met so definitely, Toby looked
sharply at her. Sally did nothing, but paused an instant. He followed
her with his eyes. Then, he stepped to her side. It was the moment and
Sally stopped sharply, shrinking a little from him.

"Going out alone?" Toby said. "Mind if I come too?" He walked beside
her. "I mean ... live in the same house."

Oh, he had plenty of assurance.

"All right; you can come," Sally vouchsafed. She was not going to show
eagerness; but she was thrilling with excitement. She moistened her
lips, her nostrils pinched and her eyes suddenly shrewd. She felt her
heart beating terribly in her breast, and was half the calculating
victor and half a genuinely shrinking young girl engaged in her first
serious exploit.

For a few moments both Toby and Sally were silent. Everything depended
upon the establishment of some instant connection between them, for
otherwise the nerve of both might fail, and a fiasco result. Toby's step
hesitated, as though he was beset by an impulse to leave her. Sally shot
a quick glance. He was wavering, and must be held.

"Nice night, isn't it?" she remarked, in a ladylike way.

The inclination to fly was checked. Toby remained by her side. They
walked together about the streets for an hour, he smoking cigarette
after cheap cigarette, and every now and then saying something that was
nothing. He was not a good talker. He could not express himself, but
said "er" between words, and moved his hands. Partly it was nervousness.
Sally often grinned at knowledge of this and of his bad way of speaking,
which made him sometimes appear almost loutish. But behind every
roughness there lay a hidden strength that she was ready to worship. She
walked beside him with steps quicker than his own, but a good swing;
exulting in their power to walk in unison, a thin little figure beside
his stoutness, her large black straw hat hiding her every expression
except when she tilted up her head and in the light of a street lamp
showed a tiny white face. Toby slouched along, one hand sometimes in a
trouser pocket, but more often with both hands in restless motion. She
could hear him: "I mean to say ... these yobs go about ... penn'orth of
chocolates and a drink at the fountain. That's all the dinner they get.
Wear a tiddy little bowler hat and never brush their boots.... Office
boys, they are; and call 'emselves junior clurks. And what's it come to?
I mean to say.... I'd rather work with my hands, like a man.... What's
the matter with a little dirt? Comes off, doesn't it?"

"Oo ... yes ..." sighed Sally, admiringly.

At last, pursuing this theme, Toby told her an anecdote about one of the
other fellows at his work. Sally listened with a breathless interest
that was only half-feigned. She wanted him to think she understood. She
wanted him to like her. She even wanted to sympathise. It was such a
mixture of feelings she had--some good, some mischievous and deliberate.
All her vanities were involved. Her nerves were taut with the strain of
such a show of absorption, while her mind ran on at top speed. She asked
pseudo-timid questions, just to show her interest and her cleverness,
and to encourage Toby to keep on telling her things that threw light
upon himself and his likes and dislikes. She walked delicately, stifled
yawns, interjected "fancy" and "there" as if she understood all he said.
She beguiled him. And all the time, under the design, her heart was
soft towards him, soft and admiring.

They walked along the darkened streets at a slow pace, and the passers
were few. Once or twice they encountered hushed couples, sometimes
laughing groups. Always Sally glanced stealthily, and summed up those
whom they saw; and had a tail glance for Toby. He appeared to ignore
everything, and slouched along at her side, as he must have done when
alone, with his head lowered. She could not make him out. In some ways
he was so self-confident, in others so much as though he had never
looked at a girl before. Did he know girls? Did he know what they were
like? What a mystery--a delicious mystery! He wasn't soppy, yet he
hardly looked at her. Funny ... funny! So she mused; continuing to give
his talk quite half her attention.

At last ten o'clock struck, and, although both wanted to stay out
longer, Sally was prudent and firm. She said "mother would wonder what
had happened," and laughed a little in her excitement, at the innuendo,
and in encouraging flattery. "_Must_ go," she added, lingering. So Toby
took her back to the corner of their road, it being a strict unspoken
covenant that they should not enter the house together, in case they
should be seen. There was no handshake; but Sally had the satisfaction
of seeing Toby awkwardly move the peak of his cap in parting. That was
ever so good, she thought. Her hard scrutiny of his manner found as yet
no cause for suspicion, but only for a renewal of her curiosity
concerning him. Toby showed no sign of any feeling beyond satisfaction
with her, and this was an irresistible flattery. She ran in, full of
excitement.


vii

What was the truth about him? Sally's thoughts bit into her observation
with intense gusto. She turned and twisted all her impressions during a
couple of wakeful hours; and she remained full of glee. What a piece of
luck. Toby! Toby, Toby, Toby! How quickly her mind worked! It was like
acid, testing and comparing; and yet its action was soft and caressing
when she remembered his figure and his voice--some of the little
gestures, some turns of speech, his sturdy contempt for what he called
"yobs," which she discovered to be the word "boys" spelt in an
unfamiliar way. Those were the things she loved. The rest she had
exploited. The mixture of pleasure and tactics filled her with delicious
dread and hunger.

When the following evening came, Sally deliberately waited until she
heard Toby go out. Only after a delay of five minutes did she put on her
hat and coat in opposition to her mother's command. What was mother?
There was a faint flush on Sally's cheeks, and a new sparkle in her
eyes. She was engaged upon an adventure. She dallied as she went down
the stairs. At the door she checked herself once more. What if he were
not there? To herself she said that she would not mind; but that was a
lie which she told to her wits. Her heart gave a different message.

How dark it was! At first Sally could see nothing. The moon, if there
was one, hid itself behind black clouds. Only specks of light came from
street lamps and between the slats of Venetian blinds. A wind hustled
about, blowing up for rain, and uncomfortably draughty. As Sally stood
on the step the door slammed behind her, and she heard a rattling run
all through the house, a banging of other doors and trembling of
window-panes. And then, as she lowered her head to meet the dusty
breeze, she felt Toby beside her, at her elbow, expectant. Sally gave a
start and a cry, for he had been so silent in the midst of all these
alarms as to come unexpectedly.

"How you startled me!" she exclaimed coquettishly. "Thought you'd gone
out _long_ ago!"

Toby gave a sort of half-confused laughing grunt.

"Hours ago I went out," he said, very close to her, deliciously bold.

"Didn't think you'd remember.... I didn't _say_ I'd come.... Have you
been waiting?" Sally sounded very nearly affected in her unplanned
speech. Toby answered with a sort of off-hand nonchalance.

"Only a minute. That's all right. I was afraid you weren't coming."
Afraid! What a lovely word! He continued, with his hand quickly at her
elbow: "Shall we go round Fairmead?"

When he spoke as he was doing now, Toby's rough voice dropped to a low
note that he believed to be gentle. It was in fact still vibrant; but
Sally liked everything about his tone and his manner. It made her feel
that he was a man; and manliness was everything to her. She longed while
she was with him to meet May ... to show her.... It would have given
Sally fierce joy. For the rest, she was content. He was by her side.
Their arms touched from time to time. When the wind blew extra strong,
she clutched him, and they stood together to resist the onset. And at
every touch Sally had fresh sense of strength and adventure.

"What you been doing to-day?" she asked, as talk flagged. He told her.
He told her a great deal more about himself, and about his aunt. He had
had the most marvellous adventures. Sally could not believe them all;
but she was charmed by the narrative. Toby talked more freely. He
hesitated less, and was more confident. Sally felt sure he must have
known other girls. You didn't talk like that if you were new to it. She
was again curious. Once she almost blurted out the question; but she
stayed the words in time. It would have been a mistake to ask anything
at this stage. It would have seemed possessive. It might have alarmed
him. Anyway, she thought, if he _has_, what does that matter? To her it
was an added pleasure, that he _might_ be wise and experienced. It was a
greater flattery; it called for greater resource in herself.

Once, when they had stopped and Sally had stood close to him so that he
might light a fresh cigarette under the shelter of her body, Toby blew
forth a puff of smoke and put his arm round her. Very coolly did Sally
free herself, perfectly mistress of the situation; but she liked him the
better for his boldness. It was the sort of thing she had dreamed--a
lover who was ardent, a lover who had to be repelled, so that the
delight of ultimate surrender should be fully savoured. Was he a lover?
Sally shivered. The attempt and the rebuff made them more intimate, as
though an understanding had been reached between them. They walked along
elbow to elbow, at first silent, and then talking freely, both in
good-humor and with continued interest. In the safe darkness Sally's
eyes glistened. The very faintest smile made her mouth enigmatic.
Already she carried herself with fresh assurance. She was conscious of
her power, and altogether resolved to maintain it by prudence.


viii

All this time Toby had never seen Sally in daylight. He had seen her in
a glimpse under the flickering hall gas, and again from time to time in
the shine of street lamps; but he had never once been with her in
daylight. She herself was conscious of this, at first accidental, but
now deliberate, mystification; and she dreaded the disclosure that was
bound to come. It was not, she knew, that she was ugly; but only that to
a man like Toby her small face and sandy hair might mark her down and
ruin everything. She feared to notice a change in him, a change from
their present and increasingly confidential relation to an indifference,
a contempt, which she might find unbearable. The feeling was acute. It
was not solely due to dependence upon Toby, but was a part of her
long-suffered self-disparagement and a fear, almost fatalistic, that she
could never keep a man's interest. The fear grew more intense as she
fell into the bitter-sweets of a lover's doubtings. The day must come,
and then what would happen? She longed to twine herself into his life
before he could see her clearly. Perhaps then he would not notice?
Perhaps even now he knew, and did not mind?

That was one mood. Another was a recognition of her own piquancy. In
this stronger mood, she concentrated upon her own prettiness, the
slimness of her body, her power to please him. But the confidence did
not last, because he had become a necessity to her. Having
half-determined to snare him, Sally was herself snared by the gins of
love. She was hard, but she was soft. She was cold, but she was warm.
And as each day she used the sewing machine or roughly stitched the raw
material for Miss Jubb's costumes, Sally always looked to the nights.
When it rained, and she had to stay indoors, she chafed irritably and
went early to bed. When she met Toby she was full of unwonted high
spirits. For a long time she did not know what had happened to her. Then
at last the truth flashed out one morning as she lay in bed, and with a
little laughing sound Sally knew that she was in love.

She was in love. And Toby, how did he feel? A new stage had been
reached, when her caution was directed to an altogether different end.
She did not now seek so coolly to play with his inclinations. She had
great need for care lest she should betray her own secret. The
occasional contacts with him had become an eager need, and must be
checked so as to make them appear as accidental as they were deliberate.
Sally was not withholding from coquetry, but from dread lest she should
give herself away and show herself over-willing. She noticed everything
he did, without watchful scrutiny, and with the merest quickness of her
caressing glance. She loved everything in him, his speech and his
movements, his strength, his stubbornness, his rough carriage and
silence. She loved him. She feared him. She did not dare to risk losing
him. Above all, she longed to be in Toby's arms, to be desired by him.

Once, when she was examining her face in the mirror, and trying to
imagine just how pretty Toby might be made to think her, Sally lost her
nerve. She was tearful all that day, tearful and speechless, so that a
rebuke from Miss Jubb brought about a real fit of crying. Miss Jubb,
astounded at such a collapse, instantly abandoned blame and showed true
kindness of heart, while May Pearcey looked on with round saucer eyes
above her round apple cheeks. And Sally went home early, ashamed of
herself, once more irritable to viciousness, and spent the time before
her mother's return lying upon the bed and trying to sleep. There was no
walk that night. Toby went out as usual, and even ventured a whistle
when she did not come; but Sally remained indoors. She did not, indeed,
hear the whistle, as she was at the back of the house; but she knew he
was waiting. She dared not go. In half an hour she heard Toby return,
and go tramping indignantly up to his room directly above. The sound
made her cry more than ever, but very quietly, in case her mother should
hear and awaken.

The next night was even more wretched, for Toby went out and was nowhere
to be seen when Sally followed him. She walked fruitlessly in the
directions they had taken upon previous evenings, and came back
disconsolate and exhausted. Pale and ill, Sally could not sleep. She had
been living poorly, and her spirit was low. The future was dismal. Toby
must have thrown her over. It was in vain that her wits consoled her
with the certainty that he must have missed her, that a boy who did not
care about her would never have shown such surly pique as his. So great
had her love become that she could not listen to such reassurance. Only
the worst was convincing enough for her misery. He was gone. He was done
with her. She had lost him. No wonder then when she was alone Sally's
eyes filled with weak tears.

Fortunately enough the next day was a Saturday, and she was able to go
alone up to Waterlow Park, on Highgate Hill. She walked up the Holloway
Road alone, and saw the autumn sun flashing upon the cross which stands
erect above St. Joseph's dome. The air was already murky with the
heaviness of the season. Leaves lay upon the ground and in the pathways.
The cable-cars grunted and groaned upon the hill, and the Park looked
bleak in the daylight. But the exercise did Sally good, and she saw
other people, and watched some children playing touch until the Park
bell rang to show that the gates were going to be closed. Even then she
lingered, watching the moving figures and noticing the greenness of the
grass under the shrivelling leaves.

From that walk she returned more healthy and in better spirits. She
determined to go out marketing with her mother in the evening, and
walked back past the flaring lamps, at which women were already
crowding, with her head in the air and her courage high. She almost
forgot Toby while she was bathed in this flustering brilliance of light
and noise. Only far below, in her heart, continued that inexhaustible
consciousness of her love. Even in this temporary oblivion she shivered
as she came to the darker part of the road.

Sally was once again among shops; and then she went down a side road.
And her heart was beating rather fast as she approached the house, in
case Toby should meet her. It was with a mingled relief and chagrin that
she reached the house alone. She was inside the door now, and the woman
on the ground floor was just standing on a chair to light the gas. Sally
had to wait for a minute until she plunged heavily down and dragged the
chair aside.

"Oh," said the woman. "There's a letter for you. It's just come. This
minute."

It was not often that Sally had a letter. Had Toby written to her? She
pounced upon the envelope. Fancy his doing that! Oh, no. It was only
from Aunt Emmy, at Brixton. Well, perhaps Aunt Emmy knew somebody in the
West End. What could she have written about?

"Is mother in, d'you know?" Sally asked the woman.

"I _fancy_ ... yes, I _fancy_ she just went out. Shoppin', I expect.
It's a nice evening. You know, what I call crisp. Not that sort of muggy
... ugh...." She gave a great shudder, as the man in the fairy tale did
when his wife poured gudgeon upon him while he slept.

Sally, threatened with a lengthy conversation, made for the stairs. She
reached their room, which was lighted; and so she knew that her mother
would not be long. A kettle was singing on a small fire of coal blocks,
and the teapot was laid to warm. Sally looked round the room, guessed
that her mother had gone out for tea or sugar, and tore open her letter.
In ugly crude writing she read the kind words Aunt Emmy had sent.

     "Dear Sally. How are you and your mother? She takes no notice when
     I write to her, so perhaps I'd better start writing to you. Such
     news I've got. I've won thirty-five pounds in a competition. I
     don't know how I did it any more than you do. Anyway, Sally, I
     don't want to forget my little niece, and so here's a little
     something for you. I'm giving the boys some, and buying a new
     dress, and then I'm going to bank the rest against a rainy day.
     Waste not, want not, you know. Don't tell mummy I've sent you
     anything, but spend it on yourself, love. Get a bit of something
     nice. Your affectionate Aunt Emmy."

Enclosed was a postal-order for a pound. Sally's heart seemed to stop
beating for an instant. She looked again at the postal-order, and with a
sharp movement put it inside her blouse. Then she put the letter in the
fire, and watched it flame and blacken and flick to pieces in the
draught. Slowly, thinking with all her might, she took off her
out-of-doors jacket and hung it up. A pound! She was rich! With a pound
you could do a lot. You could ... you could buy material for a frock.
You could buy underclothes, stockings, shoes. Not all of them, but what
you wanted. Or you could buy a hat and sweets and scent and ... oh, lots
of things! A whole pound to spend! Slowly, slowly came Sally's mind
round to something from which it instantly darted away. It crept back
again. It seized upon her will. With a pound you could ... you could
make your hair look nice and your face....

After the resolve, Sally was quite cool. She turned to greet her mother
with entire self-possession. But her ears were strained, because
overhead she heard a heavy footstep.


ix

The thing determined, Sally was faced with a great difficulty. She did
not know how to do things. She had to find out. You couldn't make a fool
of yourself and ask at a shop. She had talked to May once or twice about
... making your hair look nice ... well, dyeing it, if you wanted to
know; and May could only show her advertisements clipped from the Sunday
paper. She had not kept those advertisements: she had not liked the look
of them. Mother wouldn't know. She must do it at once. A bold plan had
come into her mind. She was near the end of her second year with Miss
Jubb. She could go into the West End if only she looked nice enough. If
she could do it to-night or to-morrow she could meet May Pearcey first
thing on Monday morning, get her to tell Miss Jubb Sally was ill, and
perhaps go after some situation during the day. What a game! But how was
she to get the stuff? That was the difficulty. No, it was the easiest
thing of all. Mrs. Perce! Mrs. Perce used peroxide, because she had once
been a barmaid. But that meant a long time. Sally must have something
quick in its action. Mrs. Perce would know. Mrs. Perce knew everything
of that kind. The notion of going shopping with her mother was
abandoned. She had more important things to do. She would go and see
Mrs. Perce immediately after tea. Then, while old Perce was playing the
piano, she would get to know everything. Sally became wildly animated.
She glimpsed the future. Transformed, she would conquer. Toby would be
won. She would be in the West End. A whole new vista opened before her,
glittering with promise. Never had she been so excited, even when Toby
first spoke to her.

Mrs. Minto wearily threw off her dingy cloak and raked the fire, so that
the kettle began to boil. She looked in a lethargic way at Sally, as a
cat looks at a stranger in whom it is not at all interested; and then
mechanically took down the tea-caddy from the mantelpiece. As she
stooped over the kettle there seemed to be cramp in all her limbs. The
little bell-pull of hair was smaller than ever, and the hair itself was
more grey. Her whole bearing expressed a lifeless dejection. Panting
faintly as the result of her late posture, Mrs. Minto brought the teapot
to the spotless table, and clumsily touched the teacups and spoons so
that they jarred upon Sally's nerves. Everything her mother did now
annoyed Sally. The slow motions, the awkward way in which her fingers
turned to thumbs, the shortsightedness that made her unable to thread a
needle or read a paper except through an old magnifying glass, the
general air of debility and discouragement. Sally felt furious with her
all the time--"Old fool ... old fool!" she would frantically murmur to
herself; and then would fall again into despair at her own sensation of
frustrate youth. She had lost love for her mother, had no pity to give
in its place; and only awoke in these moments of dreadful exasperation
to the sense that she was still dependent upon Mrs. Minto for her
existence. During this tea-time, while her mother mutely ate bread and
margarine, Sally was away in the clouds, dreaming of all that her
windfall was to produce. It was to produce beauty, opportunity,
happiness. So much for a pound to do! Sally was so impatient to call on
Mrs. Perce that she could hardly eat anything or drink her tea.

"You _are_ worritting and fidgetting, Sally," cried Mrs. Minto,
peevishly. "Sit still, there's a good girl. I don't know what's come to
my 'ead. It feels all funny inside, and if I put my hand there it's like
I got a bruise. And yet I don't remember knockin' myself anywheres, and
I can't understand it at all, because it's not as if I'd taken anything
to disagree with me; and yet there it is, a nasty pain all inside my
'ead and a feeling as though I'd got a bruise on the outside. I was
telling Mrs. ... oh, dear, what is her name?... Mrs. ... Roberson about
it, and she said that's what her 'usband used to suffer from, and ...
_he_ took...."

Sally ignored the rest of the speech. Her mother rambled on; and Sally
looked at the clock. She'd get to Hornsey Road about six. That would be
time enough. There would be the Clancy kids playing in the doorway, so
she would go straight upstairs to Mrs. Perce; and she would say....

Self-absorbed, both went mechanically on with the unappetising meal.
Upstairs Toby walked once more into his own room; and then came running
heavily down the stairs and past their door and then right down to the
street. Sally's heart was in a flutter, and her eyes flew once again to
the clock. It was so early for Toby to be going out. She would not see
him, then. She would not see him, and all her excitement was gone like
an exploded toy balloon. The heart was taken out of her enterprise. He
was going out: he did not want her: he was finished with her. Sally
could not repress the single sob that rose to her lips.

"... so I asked Mr. Flack if they'd ever kep' it, and he said no, they
never had, and told me to try at Boots's, down by the Nag's Head...."

"Oh, _mother_," cried Sally, beside herself. "Do shut up about your
head. It gives me the hump." Then, as she became aware of what she had
said, she defensively proceeded. "Well, you keep on talking about it,
and it doesn't do any _good_ to talk about it. If you want to know, I'm
ill myself. I've got a headache, and I've got the rats...."

"You got no call to speak to your mother that way," said Mrs. Minto. "If
I'd a spoke to _my_ mother like that, I should have got the strap. So
mind that, Sally. It's not nice. I've noticed you getting very
unmannerly and out of hand lately. Very rude. I don't know what to do
with you, you're so rude. It's not right, and it worries me so that I
can't think what I'm doing. I was talking about it the other day to Mrs.
Roberson, and _she_ says...."

"Yes, ma," said Sally, rising, and going to the door to take her hat
down from the peg. "She seems to have got a lot to say. Doesn't seem to
be much sense in what she says."

"Now, you're not to...." By this time Sally had one sleeve on and was
feeling for the other. In a glance at her little peaked determined face,
and obstinate mouth, Mrs. Minto's spirit suddenly failed. Where she had
meant to be maternally peremptory she became querulous. "Wherever you
going now?" she asked weakly. "Oh, you _are_ a naughty wilful girl."

"Out," said Sally, bluntly. Unheeding the outcry that followed, she was
out of the door and down the stairs before her mother could check her;
and with a new ugly sense of revolt was on her way to see Mrs. Perce in
a mood of reckless despair. Left alone, Mrs. Minto washed feebly up, and
sighingly dried the cups and plates and rearranged them in the cupboard.
Presently she sat in a limp curve over the fire, in a kind of stupor,
dreaming of she knew not what. Every now and then she would give a jerk
in anger at Sally's rudeness and recently uncontrollable highhandedness,
which recurred to her attention whenever her thoughts touched reality.
For the rest she sat motionless, until the coal-blocks subsided and the
fire went black.


x

Out in the dark streets, Sally was as if enveloped. First she looked
this way and that for Toby; but he was gone. A wave of hysteria passed
over her. She hated him. She hated him for such loutish cruelty. He
didn't care. And because he did not care, although she tried to feel
indifferent, she loved him the more. Blindly she walked away from the
house, and heard the trams grinding, and the rattle of carts over the
rough paving. Holloway Road at this point is at its worst--dull and
ugly, with an air of third-rate respectable indigence. She crossed the
road, and passed into a squalid thoroughfare called Grove Road, and
marched past the ugly houses with her head in the air, pretending that
she had no interest whatever in Toby. All her thoughts were busy
inventing indifference; and her consciousness was at each turn confusing
and contradicting her thoughts. If solitude had been possible to her,
Sally would have cried; but as a rule she cried very little, both
because she was rarely alone and because she was not naturally
hysterical. Fighting, therefore, against what she felt to be weakness,
she proceeded on her way, trying to laugh at rival butchers shouting
insults and challenges across the street. At the post office near her
old home she changed her open postal-order, and was given a
half-sovereign and ten shillings-worth of silver. This money she
carefully put, in paper, inside her blouse. She was then ready for her
interview.

At the old address new tenants already occupied the first floor flat,
and Mr. Clancy stood at the gate smoking his pipe. The man who lived in
the ground floor flat next door still showed his glass-covered sign "Why
Pay Rent?" Children littered the few inches of asphalt which served as
front garden to the two houses. Seeing Sally, Mr. Clancy took his pipe
out of his mouth, spat, and nodded at her in a friendly way.

"Hello, Sally. Keepin' well? Look fine."

"I've come to see Mrs. Perce-- Mrs. Barrow, you know."

Mr. Clancy jerked his head, receptive of the news, and as Sally passed
him continued to smoke and to regard the traffic. He must have been
bitterly cold, she thought; but she knew he must be standing outside
either because Mrs. Clancy was out or because she was in. The stairs
were just as steep as of old, and as dark. Sally had absolutely no
memory of her father's fall. She was merely curious about the new people
in the flat. But she did not see them, for all the doors were closed,
and she kicked her feet against the stairs, stumbling a little in the
darkness.

At her further progress a door flew open above, and Mrs. Perce looked
out.

"Sally! Well I never!" she ejaculated. "Perce! Here's Sally come to see
you!" Perce's reply did not reach Sally, but there was an exchanged kiss
with Mrs. Perce, and then her coat and hat were off and she was
conscious of overpowering warmth and kippers and a general sizzle of
comfort and plenty. "Had your tea?" demanded Mrs. Perce. "Have another.
Come on. Plenty of kippers. Perce! Sally's eating your kippers!"

Perce appeared, rubbing the back of his neck with a towel--a large fair
red-faced man with a broad grin. He put his hand on Sally's shoulder,
and shook her. Then he went out of the room again, and Sally began
almost immediately upon the feast. It was such a jolly, cosy, close
room, so bright and gaudy in its decoration, that it was Sally's idea of
what a kitchen should be. The walls were a varnished brown, so that they
shone in the lamplight. Polished candlesticks stood by a shiny clock on
the mantelpiece. There were bright pictures and a brilliant lamp and a
glittering tablecloth covered with polished dishes and silver. She had a
great admiration for old Perce and Mrs. Perce. They both loved comfort
and food and drink, and both had hearty laughs that showed all their
teeth. Both had shrewd, glistening, money-engrossed eyes; both were
large and stout and cheerful and noisy. To anybody as young as Sally
noise goes a long way towards cheeriness, because it deadens thought. So
when old Perce came and took his place at the table she suddenly threw
off her despair with the volatility of childhood, and laughed aloud and
ate and drank, and made sly remarks, until she became an altogether
different Sally from the one who had taken an earlier tea with her
mother. She was now in high spirits. All sorts of funny things came into
her head--things she had seen and thought since their last meeting; and
when she repeated them the Barrows laughed in great roars that filled
her with conceited exultation. It was so long since she had laughed. It
was so long since she had fed properly. This was like a dream, a riotous
dream of noise and colour. She looked from old Perce's red face to Mrs.
Perce's almost equally florid cheeks, her eyes travelling like
dragon-flies, as bright and eager as possible.

And all the time she was taking in Mrs. Perce's appearance. Mrs. Perce
wore a black silk dress, very plain, but well-cut. She had a gold
brooch at her throat, and a thin gold chain round her neck. Her hair was
abundant, and was dressed in a great blob upon the top of her head. It
was a noticeable colour, fair and startling. She did not decorate her
eyebrows and eyelashes, which were darker than her hair. And she wore
high corsets, because her bosom, although firm, was inclined to be
over-flowing. The bodice of her dress fitted closely and emphasised what
was still a very shapely figure. She was what would be called a fine
woman. Her eyes were full and clear; her lips were well-moulded; her
teeth, rather protruding, were unimpaired. Sally was filled with renewed
envy of her personal advantages. Then her eyes went back to Mrs. Perce's
hair. It was too obviously doctored. She didn't want anything like that.
She wanted something more delicate....

The truth flashed upon her. Mrs. Perce was a trifle on the coarse side.
Sally quickly compared Mrs. Perce's plump hands with her own lean ones.
At the scrutiny, she put her hands below the table, for they were not
clean. But if they had been clean she would have taken pride in them;
for where the fingers of Mrs. Perce were stubby her own were slim and
pretty. She understood her own shortcomings, but in the quick
observations and comparisons she had been making, Sally had learnt a
great deal more clearly than ever before how careful she must be to
avoid exaggeration in all she did. Dressed and adorned as Mrs. Perce was
dressed and adorned, she would have looked a guy. It was a new lesson to
her, and a valuable one.

"Have you noticed," said Mrs. Perce, "how me and Perce's dressed up
to-day?"

Sally was staggered. She looked quickly at old Perce and saw that he was
in his best clothes, with a lovely new spotted blue and white tie, and
a dahlia in his buttonhole.

"Of course," she said. "I noticed everything. Didn't like to ask. What
is it? Is it your birthday? Wish I'd known," she added, half-truthfully.
"I'd a brought you a present."

"No," laughed Mrs. Perce. "Very good guess. Not a birthday. It's the
anniversary of our wedding-day. Been married nine years, we have."

"Nine years!" echoed Sally, awestruck. "Nine years! And you haven't had
a baby yet!"

There was a startling guffaw. Old Perce slapped his leg and bayed. Mrs.
Perce threw herself back in her chair, showing every brilliant tooth.
The noise was tremendous.

"The things she says!" shrieked Mrs. Perce. "Perce, I always said that
child was a caution!" They both laughed until they were in an extremity
of mirth.

Sally recognised herself as a wit, flushed, and laughed as heartily as
they. She had spoken incautiously, as a child, and without
sophistication. But she accepted responsibility for her joke. She was
not in the least flurried, but was pleased at being considered an adept
in the ways of marriage. At heart she was despising herself for not
having been more truly observant of their clothes, because in reality
she had been so concentrated upon Mrs. Perce that she had never thought
to spare an eye for Mrs. Perce's husband. She was thankful to have
ridden off so easily upon her naïveté. Meanwhile, having laughed amply,
the Barrows had resumed their tea.

"Nine years, eh!" said old Perce, reflectively. "Takes some believing,
Poll. Nine years. Nine years, and no baby, eh!" He shook his head, like
a cat sneezing, and laughed again. "Here, Sally. Have some more kipper.
More tea, then. Poll, here's a lady will have some more tea, if you
please, ma'am. Sweet enough, Sally? As before, if you please, Poll."

"See, where was you then, Perce?" asked Mrs. Perce. "Nine years ago."

"This time nine years ago----" murmured old Perce, reflectively. "I was
at Potter's. Yes, Sally, I waddn't makin' above two pound a week when I
got married--if that. Two pound a week was about my top-notch in those
days. Well, it's different now." He shrugged his shoulders. "And I'll
tell you for why, Sally. It was Poll, there. Don't you forget it. If a
man's got a good wife--say there's something in him--he'll end his days
in comfort. _She'll_ see to that. Now, the man you marry----"

"Here, Perce! Steady on!" cried Mrs. Perce. "Sally's not seventeen yet,
remember."

"Wait!" Old Perce directed a finger. Sally was brimming with gladness,
at the topic and the confidence in herself which she saw he was going to
express. "The man you marry, Sally--he'll have to _be_ a man. Understan'
what I mean? None of these fine la-di-da fellows, but a Man. And--if he
works, you save. Not to scrape, you understand. Just save. For the first
five years, be careful. Have your fun. No harm in that. But be careful.
No kids. No swank. Stability, that's what's wanted. Stability. If you've
got a bit of money behind you---- See what I mean?"

"Oo yes, Mr. Barrow," said Sally, incoherent with pride. "That's just
what I think."

Old Perce looked at Mrs. Perce, raising his shoulders as if to exhibit
Sally to her. There was a nod between them. For some time all became
rather thoughtful, perhaps thinking--as she was uncontrollably doing--of
Sally's future. Old Perce took out his pipe at last.

"I'm just going to step in the other room, Sally," he remarked, "and
have a pipe and a bit of a tune. I'll see you later--you ladies," he
added gallantly, with a bow. And then he withdrew, leaving them alone,
with Sally's cheeks flushed at the warmth and the subject they had been
considering. All the time old Perce had been talking she had been
wishing that Toby had been there to hear. Then he'd have seen what these
people thought of her. They didn't think of her face; they didn't go off
in a huff because she had been too ill to go out one evening. They
knew.... Tears filled her eyes. She stared at the red fire in the grate.
Mrs. Perce had her back turned, filling the kettle for the inevitable
washing-up, and so she did not see this sudden arrival of tragic
reflection. All she saw was a willing Sally gathering the dishes and
scraping the fishbones together ready for throwing behind the fire. How
was Mrs. Perce to visualise that other tea, that lonely figure in the
other room? How was anybody to understand why Sally was so different
from what she had been at home?

Over the washing-up, the two became confidential. Sally broached the
subject of the West End. She dilated upon it. Mrs. Perce was all
sympathy, and full of agreement.

"You're quite right," she said. "And I'm glad. I wish I could help you.
Now, can I?" She thought a moment. "Wait a bit. Wait a bit."

She went out of the room. Amid the din of "There you are, there you are,
there you ain't--ain't--ain't," Sally heard her call: "Perce, what's the
name Maggie Merrick calls herself now?" There was a silence. The door of
the other room was closed. Sally, standing by the kitchen table, drying
a plate, strained her ears unavailingly. A silence was upon the flat.
Only the fire huskily caved in, and little darting sparks flew into the
air. It was as though her life hung suspended. Then, in a few minutes,
Mrs. Perce returned, a triumphant beam upon her face. "You go and see
Maggie on Monday," she said. "I'll write her a letter. She calls herself
Gala--Madame Gala. Got a place round behind Regent Street, and about
twenty hands. She's a very old friend of mine.... I'll give you a letter
to-night. Just say you come from Polly Barrow. She'll see you. Course, I
can't be sure...."

"No, no!" Sally's concurrence was eager. Her heart was like a flame.
"You _are_ kind to me, Mrs. Perce."

"If I can help you, Sally...." Mrs. Perce's voice took on a tone of
kindness almost solemn. "Well, that's all right. Just wait till these
things are washed."

Trembling, Sally introduced her other problem. At first Mrs. Perce gave
a great laugh, and looked very sharply at Sally. She looked at her
dress, at her face, at her hair.

"I don't want to look...."

"It wouldn't help you to look made-up. Not with Maggie. So there _is_ a
boy!"

"No!" Sally's tone was fierce.

"Oh, all right." Mrs. Perce was evidently not altogether convinced. She
dried her hands, her head consideringly upon one side.

"Who'd look at me?" There was a vain effort in this speech to
corroborate the disclaimer; but there was also an ingenuous and pathetic
appeal for some sort of reassurance, for this was Sally's hidden fear.

"Don't be a fool, Sally. If a girl makes up her mind to have a man...."

Sally's heart leapt. She looked with shining eyes of glory at Mrs.
Perce. It was the announcement of her dream, a confirmation of her hope.
She was for a moment ecstatic.

"Oh, Mrs. Perce!"

"You just look at him like that, my dear. Well, I'll tell you.... You
don't want to look _too_ fresh. Don't use peroxide. Henna's the stuff
for you."

"Henna! How much?" Sally was desperate. The word was open sesame to her.

"Wait a bit. I'll think. Henna. And a face cream. But mind, Sally, be
careful. Not too much of it. And whatever you do, remember your neck.
_You_ don't see it; but others do. All that's above your dress. And a
bit below. Some people are inquisitive. And just a bit of lip
salve--just a tinge. See, your lips aren't red enough. But you've got to
be on the watch not to overdo it. No good looking like a tart."

"No. It's just the hair and the freckles," breathed Sally.

"Oh, well.... We'll make a picture of you. And the eyebrows, Sally. But
only a bit, Sally. Only a bit. You've got to be moderate...."

Mrs. Perce went off into a delighted silence. She was in her element.
She had before her a great opportunity, and all her vanity was roused.
They understood one another. And for all Sally's disclaimer Mrs. Perce
was in no way deceived about her ultimate object. She was as aware of
Toby as if she knew the facts. But she was too shrewd to force a
confidence. To herself she was laughing with the full enjoyment which
some women, if not most of them, bring to the contemplation of an
intrigue and its ultimate consequences. Later, she resolved to add a
word of warning upon the handling of that subject. But more thought
encouraged her to be silent. There was that in Sally's bearing which
gave Mrs. Perce to understand that in the long run Sally knew what she
was about. Mrs. Perce was conscious of a smart feeling of admiration for
this child.


xi

Clasping tightly the precious henna and her other purchases, Sally
hurried home through the dark streets. Within her blouse was the letter
to Madame Gala. Her head was full of her plans, her delighted
anticipations of victory. For this moment she could not contemplate the
possibility that all would not go well. She was intoxicated. Her heart
was swelling. Thoughts galloped away, like steam from a boiling kettle.
She kept no memory of them. It was enough for her that she was thrilled
with her own prospects. Of course Mrs. Perce's friend would take her on.
Of course Toby would fall in love with her. She could make him. Once let
her achieve her immediate objects, and there was no end to future
possibilities. How strange, how wonderful, the difference which the last
few hours had made to her! It really seemed true for once that in the
darkest hour dawn was most nearly at hand. She let herself into the
house and crept up the stairs, subdued but exultant. It would now have
taken much more than the coldness and darkness of the horrible room to
spoil her excited happiness. She even welcomed them, because if her
mother awoke there would be the less need for explanations. She stood a
candle upon the washstand, screened from the bed, and lighted the oil
stove which they always used for preparing the breakfast. Her purchases
were carefully arrayed, and then hidden. She removed her outer clothes,
and let down her hair, shivering slightly, but tense with resolve and
the absorption of the moment. Round her shoulders she hung a big towel,
and kicked it out, looking down at her legs and feet. She was conscious
of pride, of physical freedom. She made small dancing steps, as happy as
a child, while she waited and waited for the slow kettle to boil.

Later, Sally stole to bed, careful not to touch her sleeping mother,
lest her own chill body should awaken her and provoke a querulous scene.
She was shuddering from head to foot. It seemed to take hours to shake
off the frozen feeling, and if she raised her feet and touched them with
her hands they were like pieces of ice. They were still cold when she
forgot everything; and she awoke, the towel still about her head, with
the sun up and the day well advanced. A careful hand to her hair, a
quick scurry to the mirror, a leap of apprehensiveness; and then she was
back in bed, shamming sleep, because her mother had stirred. The two lay
side by side for ever so long, until Sally could once again allow
herself to breathe freely. She did not examine her feelings: she only
knew that she was afraid and confident, alternately timid and ashamed,
and then again breathing deep with satisfaction. She had begun. She was
set out upon her adventure. At a blow she had to put everything to the
test. How she longed for the next day! How she longed for her interview
with Mrs. Perce's friend, and for her next encounter with Toby!


xii

At night she allowed her mother to go to bed first, and waited a little
while before beginning her preparations. She was so long that her
mother, although still engrossed by the pain in her head, began to
grumble.

"What you doing, Sally?" she cried sharply.

"Washing my hair," answered Sally, like a shot.

"Ought to have done it in daylight, silly girl. And dried it in front
the fire. I don't know what's _come_ to you, Sally. You seem to do
everything you can to worrit me. Now I want to go to sleep, and you keep
the lamp burning, and the fire burning, and it's all alight, so I can't
get off."

Sally shaded the lamp. Her lip was curled. She did not deign to answer
the complaint. Silly old fool; always grumbling! Let her wait. Let her
wait and see what happened! Sally was less excited, and less clumsy,
to-night. She was warmer, too; and that gave her more assurance. Once
her mother had fallen asleep, as she knew from the loud breathing, she
became leisurely. Her actions were even luxurious, so much more at ease
was she. First of all she combed her hair, wishing it were longer. Then
she made all her dispositions. For the next hour she was busy, and by
the time she was in bed she had begun to giggle almost hysterically. She
lay quite still, and quite warm, listening for some sound of Toby. But
none came. Wherever he was, she did not hear him before she went to
sleep.

And then in the dark morning her mother could not see the transformation
that had occurred; and Sally could not see it, either. They made a slow
and tasteless breakfast, and Mrs. Minto slipped out to her first
situation, where she had to be at half-past seven. From that she would
go on to another at half-past ten that would keep her for the greater
part of the afternoon. Sally, instead of going back to bed, as she often
did when the two breakfasted together, dressed herself with great care
and prepared to go out and meet May Pearcey. She tried to see herself in
the mirror, but could only get a lamplight view that frightened her. She
had washed very carefully, and as she had made her own dress it fitted
well and suited her. She had a big black hat and was going to get new
gloves before calling upon Madame Gala. Her shoes were bad, but she
brushed them well. Stockings she had bought on Saturday night. Turning
round and round before the mirror, extending her arms, and patting down
her skirt, she was content with everything but the incalculable effect
of her recent activities. But the part of her hair which showed beneath
her hat was a rich shade, and if her face looked artificially pale it
still appeared smooth and fresh.

What doubt she may have had was set at rest by May Pearcey when they
met. The encounter took place in Grove Road at the corner of Hornsey
Road, just where the shops are; and the two girls walked westward
together.

"Oo, Sally, you _do_ look smart!" May irrepressibly cried. "Oo, what you
bin doing to your hair! Looks lervly! Oo, and your face. Got off with a
earl?"

She was all attention at Sally's tale, and Sally showed her the letter
to Madame Gala. They stood together reading it. For the moment May was
honestly full of congratulation. She was so simple-minded, and so little
attached to the dressmaking, that she had no envy. A boy would have been
a different matter. And she was honestly delighted with Sally's
appearance.

"You look lervly!" she kept saying. "Oo, I do hope you get it. I say,
come out 's evening, and tell me. Will you?" May was very coaxing
indeed. She was sincerely impressed.

It was a compliment, as well as a curiosity. Sally hesitated. She had
planned to see Toby; but if Toby was going to be a lout she might just
as well show him she didn't care.

"All right," she said. "Look here, if I'm not there by half-past seven,
you'll know I've been kept--mother's kept me. See?"

"Mother!" laughed May. "Well, I'll be there quarter-past. See! Shouldn't
come any further, case old Mother Jubb's lookin' out the window. She
might not believe you was ill if she saw you lookin' so smart. Might
think you was takin' a day off to go to the Zoo."

They parted, May Pearcey to spin a tale of Sally's illness to Miss
Jubb, and Sally to proceed, after getting a pair of black cotton gloves,
to the West End. In the shop, half hidden among the rolls of flannel and
little racks and trays of smaller articles of haberdashery, there was a
full-length strip of mirror. It stood gloomily in the half-light of the
shop, which, like all suburban drapers' shops, had the air of a crowded
and airless cavern full of stale adornments. Sally did not see the
mirror at first, but while the shop girl went to fetch the gloves, she
was looking idly round when she caught sight of a slim young lady in
black. The young lady was very trim, dressed all in black, with slim
ankles and pretty hands, and a big black hat--and it was herself!
Herself, looking like a lady. Quickly, she stepped to the mirror,
examining her cheeks, her neck, her brows, and her gloriously
richly-tinted hair. She was amazed and delighted. A proud smile twisted
her thin little lips, so slightly touched with Lipsol that they did not
seem to have been touched at all, but only to be prettier than usual.
After the first curiosity, the first flush of recognition, followed
precise scrutiny. Sally nodded to herself. She would do. There was no
doubt of it. From that moment she was no longer triumphant or excited:
she was sure. She had learnt a great lesson, that excitement is no
criterion of victory or happiness, and that the artist is cool,
confident, free from triumph. At a bound, Sally had become an artist.
She had always been potentially an artist; but she at last had attained
vision.


xiii

Precious pennies went to pay her tram fare to Tottenham Court Road; and
from there she walked to Madame Gala's, asking the way, and getting
rather flustered and bewildered at the pushing crowds and the big shops
with their irresistible windows, and the extraordinary amount of
traffic that seemed to make Oxford Street one continuous torrent of
carts and omnibuses. The big furniture shops in Tottenham Court Road had
impressed her; but the shops in Oxford Street were beyond anything she
ever remembered to have seen. A flash of comparison with Holloway--even
with Jones's magnificent row of shops on the way to Highbury, or the big
drapers and clothiers in the Upper Street--made her realise how right
had been her longing for the West End. It had been more than a dream. It
had been an inspiration. Holloway was seen in its dinginess, its greasy
mud on the rough roads, the general air it had of being a step or two
behind the times; and here was the brilliance, the enthralling reality,
of the West to take its place. Sally was conscious of new buoyancy. If
she had been pleased with Tottenham Court Road, and delighted with the
essentially commonplace Oxford Street, she exulted in that alluring
curve which will always make Regent Street a fascination for the visitor
to London and even a satisfaction to the Londoner himself. Sally was
both a Londoner and a visitor, and her feelings were proportionate. She
did not know that she was proud of being London born and bred; but her
eye was possessive, and she would not have given London in exchange for
the dozen other great capitals of the world put together. She looked
round at the shops, at the buildings and the traffic; and she made a
historic remark.

"Cooh," she said. "Fine! Fancy _living_ here! This is the place for me."

It was final. It took no account of the risks of a peradventure. Madame
Gala was a mere cog in the great wheel of Sally's progress through life.
Even Toby had at first no place in her survey. Then she wondered if he
knew Regent Street. He could come one Saturday and wait for her outside
Madame Gala's. They would swank, and go and have tea at an A. B. C. or
Lyons's; and perhaps go into Hyde Park. Gradually it came back to her
that her father used to take them to Hyde Park on Sundays. But that was
long ago, and on Sundays the traffic was less and the shops were all
shuttered. She gave a sigh at the memory, awoke, and marched up to a
colossal policeman who was wagging a pair of gloves in his right
hand--as if to keep the flies away, but in reality to encourage the
traffic. He inclined an ear, and an eye to her letter, and trumpeted out
directions.

And at last Sally reached Madame Gala's, and with Madame Gala's another
turning-point in her life. It was the first time she had been conscious
of so all-important an event. When she came to the building she was
trembling. Her eyes closed, almost in an expression of prayer. She took
five minutes to climb the stairs to the second floor, and then turned to
fly. She recovered, and hung about for a while, hoping for some accident
to carry her right into the place. Then, with a feeble air of
confidence, she pushed open the door and walked in without knocking.

Sally could have fallen down in horror; for as she entered she saw a
very tall young woman talking to the most beautifully dressed person she
had ever seen. And they were in a room such as Sally had never been in
before--a room entirely decorated in a sort of grey-blue. Wallpaper,
hangings, and chair-upholsterings were exactly uniform. The effect,
although beautiful and restful, was to Sally's eye so sumptuous that she
felt she must by some terrible mischance have come into a drawing-room.
But she heard the young woman say, "Yes, meddam.... I'll tell Madame
Gala.... Yes, meddam.... Yes, meddam ... quite ... yes, I quite....
_Good_ morning, meddam." And then as the wonderful creature disappeared
in a whirl of richness, like a fairy godmother, the tall young woman
turned almost pouncingly upon Sally, and in a contemptuous voice said
"Yes?"

Sally shook herself. It was the gesture of one who has been dreaming.

"I want to see Madame Gala," she said, very distinctly. "I've got a
letter for her from Mrs. Barrow."

"Where is it?" demanded the young woman. "That it?"

She took from Sally's unwilling but unresisting hand the letter which
Mrs. Perce had written, pulled it from the open envelope, read it, and
looked again at Sally.

"I want to _see_ Madame Gala," said Sally, stubbornly. Her little mouth
was now very savagely set, and if there had been any refusal upon the
young woman's part there would have been a scene.

"All right. Keep your hair on," said the inquisitive young woman. "Are
you Miss Minto?"

"Yes, I am." Sally nodded energetically, flushing. She wondered if the
word "hair"....

Her interlocutor turned, and went into an inner room, replacing the
letter as she did so, and folding over the flap, so that it would seem
as though she knew nothing of the contents. Sally quickly saw the kind
of person she was--an interfering creature, with "Miss Pry" written all
over her. She was tall and thin, and had gooseberry eyes and a small
nose and a large sycophantic mouth. Sally had a picture of her all the
time she was away--grey-blue dress and all. She didn't like her. She
hated her. She knew that they would never get on together. Miss Nosey!
"Yes, meddam; no, meddam ... yes, I _quite_...." Sally tried to
pronounce quite "quaite," as she had done. After all, she was only a
sort of maid--somebody to take the names of callers. She'd got no right
to be saucy. Old six-foot. Old match-legs. She'd got a nose in
everybody's business. Mind she didn't get it pulled!... But what a
lovely room! Must have cost pounds and pounds! All grey-blue--even to
the little ornaments on the mantelpiece, all except the black tiger.
Fancy working in a place like this! Different to Miss Jubb's! Sally gave
a sort of internal giggle, a noiseless affair that was almost just a
wriggle of delight. Miss Jubb! Did you ever see anything like the dress
she made for Mrs. Miller, of 17 Tavistock! Chronic, it was! Like a
concertina! And poor old Annie Jubb getting flurried when the material
frayed in the scissors! Cooh! Call her a dressmaker! More like a figure
of fun!

"Come in, please," said Nosey, jerking her nose. And Sally started once
again from reverie, to follow the tall young woman from the grey-blue
room into another one which was all in a warm colour between orange and
biscuit. She swallowed quickly, and heard a little runnel of moisture in
her dry throat. There was a throbbing behind her eyes. She became very
small and clumsy, and kept her head lowered, and her hands clasped.

When a voice bade her sit down, Sally stole a quick glance at Madame
Gala. At once she lowered her eyes again, because they had met
unexpectedly a pair of eyes more disconcerting than any she had known
since her schooldays. Madame Gala did not employ a score of hands for
nothing! She had looked at Sally the moment Sally came into the room,
and did not cease to look at her. And she had very cold grey eyes, and
was very cold (really very deficient in stamina) herself. She was
terribly thin, and chilling, and capable. She was dressed in grey; but
you could not see the dress except at the bottom of the skirt and the
middle of the sleeves, because she wore a large pinafore-overall, of a
lighter grey and a softer material. She had no pins in her mouth, and
there were no pictures of costumes or sheets of paper patterns to be
seen. But the room, all the same, was a workroom, and there was a
beautiful large table in it which could have served for cutting out a
costume for a giantess.

"You're Miss Minto. How old are you? Hn, small for your age. Mother and
father? When did your--oh, you're in mourning for him. How did he die?
What sort of accident? Hn.... What experience have you had? Miss _What?_
Oh, yes ... two years. Have you left? I see. Well, Mrs. Barrow's an old
friend of mine, and I'd like to oblige her. Also, I want more help. My
business is increasing. If you can start in a fortnight I'll pay you
six--no, I'll pay you seven shillings a week. You get here at nine in
the morning. You'll do as you're told, and behave yourself. You'll work
under a very clever lady, Miss Summers, in that room. I'll show you.
Come in here...."

Sally, shaking with jubilation, followed her into a very large room
adjoining, where a number of girls were (apparently) frantically
busy--far too busy to be conscious that their employer had entered the
room. Sally did not believe that they were always so intent upon their
work. She knew too much. To herself she said "Swank!" It was a
beautifully light place, all decorated in a pale grey; and there was a
long deep bench all round the room. It was lighted by windows and a
skylight, and it was plain that a considerable amount of work was in
progress. Sally gave a dazed glance round, and looked again, saying,
"Yes, ma'am; Yes, ma'am," to everything Madame Gala said; and a few
minutes later was out in the street again, engaged at seven shillings a
week, and not knowing whether she was alive or dead, awake or dreaming.
The day was still before her; she had nearly ten shillings hidden in her
bodice; and she was a queen amid all the surging traffic of the West
End--her West End--the place of her dreams, her pilgrimage, her triumph.
Sally's eyes were filmed with tears. She walked away from the building
passionately fighting with sobs that rose from deep within her. The
tears trickled down her white cheeks. And all at once she was laughing
again, chuckling and chuckling as if this was the most splendid joke in
the world. And then, when the laughter was done, she was once again
Sally, deliberate, cool and unflinching. This was what she had
determined. There were other steps to follow. She must not be too sure;
she must go carefully. But all the same she would win. She was Sally.
She was going to get on. She was going to be cautious. She was going to
be secure. That was her touchstone--security. Without it, she would
never know peace. At all costs, security. That meant keeping cool. That
meant watching your step. And in the end it meant making money, and
having enough to eat, and nice clothes, and pleasures, and all that she
had never yet had. Into the eyes that had been brimming with tears, and,
immediately after, with glee, there came once again a hardness, a
determination. It was the expression of a wary animal, treading among
dangers.


xiv

By an instinct, Sally turned west, so that she presently found herself
in a confusing number of small streets; but when she had extricated
herself and had mastered the geography of that part of London she was
rewarded by coming out into Park Lane, with the fine breadth of Hyde
Park open to her eyes and her impulse towards exploration. She pretended
that she knew the Park; but in fact to her older eyes and in its weekday
freedom from crowds it looked so different that she could not link it
with ancient memories. Thus, for a time, its paths and its greenness and
its air of great space gave her unqualified pleasure. She wandered on,
observing the fallen leaves, and the few pedestrians; and looked up at
the blue sky, and marvelled to herself; and then presently she sat down
upon one of the public seats and tried to get some coherence into her
thoughts. She sat there for some time, her shabby little toes cocked up
on the gravel before her, and she began to feel lonely and tired and
restless, as though something further had still to be done. There was
the whole day before her. She could not stay here, because although the
day was clear and fine there was a chill wind, and she was not warmly
clad. Already her hands were feeling numb in the cotton gloves, and her
feet were losing the pleasant tired tingle they had had a short time
before. The sense of innumerable hours which had to be filled was strong
upon Sally, who had never previously had so much time to herself, alone.
So she rose briskly from her seat, walked along the broad pathway, and
came back to the Marble Arch, where Oxford Street began again. This time
she was bent upon looking at the shops, and browsed for a time at the
windows of Lewis's, at the end of Orchard Street. And then she had her
inspiration. A clock told her it was after half-past eleven. May's words
came into her mind: "She might think you was takin' a day off to go to
the Zoo."

"Here, where's the Zoo," she suddenly, without a tremor, asked a
policeman.

"They got plenty white mice," the policeman said. "No good you a-goin'
there."

"Saucy!" rebuked Sally. "Suppose they let you out ... on a chain."

"Quite right," said the policeman. "Didn't want to let me go. Everybody
loved little Sammy. But the Police Force wanted me."

"Fancy wanting _you_!" remarked Sally, witheringly, staring at his
good-tempered face, and, under his helmet, at a pair of bright blue
eyes. He was a "red" man. "Give 'em a bit of ginger, I suppose."

"As you go by the Marrabon Road, you just cross over and go into Madame
Tussaud's. You'll see a lot of old friends and relations there. Charlie
Peace, and Mother Dyer...."

"Who's she?" Sally demanded. "Mother Dyer. Never heard of her."

"Mother Dyer? Baby-farmer. Her you used to call 'Nursie.' Go straight
along here, and when you've looked at Madame Tussaud's, keep down the
Marrabon Road till you come to the Park. See? Regent's Park, that is.
And walk along the nice broad road, and you'll find the Zoo on your
left. Good morning, my dear.... Don't let 'em keep you, will you?...
Cahm alahng, 'ere; cahm alahng, 'ere." He broke off to attend to the
traffic, which he addressed in a very different way from that in which
he had spoken to Sally; and she, rather cheered by the exchange of
badinage, set off towards Baker Street and the Marylebone Road with a
new interest in hand. Madame Tussaud's and the Zoo in one day! What a
day it would have been by the time she reached the end of it. What a
tale she would be able to tell May in the evening!

Apart from the two visits which she made, to the wax-works and the
menagerie, both of which took so long that she did not get home until
six o'clock, Sally had no other adventure. She had lunch in the Zoo, and
arrived back in Holloway with less than five shillings remaining from
her windfall. But it had been a day, and it still held marvellous
possibilities of an encounter with Toby. Her first thought on reaching
home was of him. That was why she was so deaf to her mother's
complaining. She did not hear it. And she did not tell her mother of the
day's outing. There would be time for that later. If she told her now
there would only be trouble, and Sally was tired of trouble. When she
had explained to Miss Jubb, and had left Miss Jubb on Saturday week, she
would airily say to her mother: "I got a job in the West End, now." See
ma jump! Sally was conscious for the first time of a slightly sinking
heart. Suppose she didn't suit Madame Gala? Suppose she lost her new job
after a week or two? Oh, rubbish.... Rot! Time enough for the gripes
when she got the sack!

She could hear no sound at all from the room above. Was Toby not home
yet? He used to get home about ten minutes past six, as a rule. It was
now a quarter-past. If she did not hear him she would go and meet May,
and then call in to tell Mrs. Perce all about the news, and then come
home after her mother had gone to bed. She had her tea, turning up her
nose at it, and all the time wishing for something better. For some time
after the meal she stood about reflecting upon her day and upon the
possibilities of the future. Consideringly, she at last said in a
matter-of-fact tone:

"One day we'll have jam for tea, ma. And kippers. And fried sausages.
And steak and chips."

"Good gracious!" cried Mrs. Minto. "Whatever's put such ideas into your
head!"

"And we'll have real coal, and thick blankets, and a new mattress, and
new curtains, and a brass fender. And everything in the room'll be a
beautiful gray-blue. And you'll sit here, doing nothing."

"I'm sure I shan't," exclaimed Mrs. Minto, fingering her mouth to hide a
nervous smile of pleasure.

"Doing nothing. And Elbert, the footman, will come in with the tea and
take it away again; and you'll say, Elbert'--mustn't say 'Elbert
dear'--you'll say, 'Elbert, just bring me my glass of hot water at ten
o'clock.' And he'll say, 'Yes, me lady.' No, he won't. He'll say, 'Yes,
meddam ... quite.... Yes, meddam.' That's what he'll say. Lick your
shoes, he will, because you're rich."

"Rich!" sighed Mrs. Minto. "Who's to make me rich?"

"I'm going to make us all rich," explained Sally. "You mark my words and
wait and see."

"I wouldn't mind not being rich," Mrs. Minto said, "if it wasn't that my
poor 'ed...."

"O-oh!" cried Sally, in wrath. Her mood was crushed by this inexorable
return to the subject she had been chattering to avert. "Give your old
head a rest, ma. Here, come out for a walk with me."

"You're not to go out, Sally. Mrs. Roberson says...."

"_That_ for Mrs. Roberson," said Sally, already on her feet. "You don't
suppose I'm going to stick in here and get frozen stiff. There's nothing
to do indoors. I got no sewing. Only makes me fret if I stay at home.
I'm going to see Mrs. Perce...."

She moved hastily to the door, and closed it quietly after her, for she
had heard below her the shutting of the front door, and she thought it
might be Toby at last. It was nearly a quarter to seven. Her guess had
been right. It was he. Seeming not to have heard him, she ran lightly
down the stairs as he heavily mounted them. Her heart was thumping so
that she felt quite sick and faint. She could no longer run, but could
only totter down towards the inevitable confrontation. It was there, and
it was past--a plain, boorish "Evening." She managed the rest of the
flight at a run; but when she was out of doors Sally turned to the
darkness and could no longer restrain her tears of anguish. This was the
end of her day. Laugh in the morning, cry before night. That was the
truest proverb that ever was made. She was heartbroken.


xv

There was no question of seeing May or calling upon Mrs. Perce. Sally
was beaten. She was full of expostulations and arguments, but all were
addressed to Toby, and she could not have borne any other society. So
she wandered about the streets for an hour, miserably aware that once or
twice she was followed by an aimless strolling youth who did not know
how to occupy a lonely evening and who yet was too much of a coward to
address her. In her mind she went over every detail of her friendship
with Toby. It had become suddenly unreal, like a thing that had happened
years before. And yet the throb of pain belonging to her sense of his
cruelty was immediate. Every detail was clear to her; and the whole was
blurred. He was a stranger; and yet his presence would at once have
given life to her memories. They had been written, as it were, in
invisible ink, which needed only the warmth of a fire to produce their
message vividly once again. Sally sobbed from time to time; but she was
no longer crying. Her pain was too deep to be relieved by tears, which
with her were the result of weakness, since she was not naturally
liquid. And as the memory was exhausted in its evocation she began to
think as of old. Her quick brain was recovering its sway. She was no
longer an overwrought child. And yet when she strove to plan a
discomfiture for Toby, who had so wickedly hurt her, she shrank from
that also; so it was still a restless and undetermined Sally who
returned home to find her mother dozing by the feeble warmth of a dying
fire.

The next day passed in a variety of moods, and in the evening Sally
found in herself the determination to call upon Mrs. Perce. She had
explained her non-arrival of the previous night to May, and had removed
her grievance with a recital of all she had done during the stolen day.
She had endured Miss Jubb's sour scrutiny of her hair, which was
accomplished without comment. And she had almost, but not quite, told
Miss Jubb of her proposed change. At times her courage was very nearly
high enough, but it never reached the necessary point, or the
opportunity was ruined at the vital moment by some interruption. So Miss
Jubb worked innocently, not guessing the blow that was to fall. That it
would be a serious blow only Sally suspected. Miss Jubb had never even
supposed it possible that Sally would leave her. The three of them spent
the day in the little workroom, which managed by the end of the
afternoon to be the coldest and the closest room in the neighbourhood,
perhaps owing to Miss Jubb's use of a defective stove for heating, and
her own radical immunity from chilblains.

After tea Sally went straight to Hornsey Road. In thinking of Toby as
she left the house she made a light gesture with her fingers to show
that he no longer existed. If she had met him she would have attempted
no greeting, for such was her present temper. At the Barrows' she was
received with acclamation. Old Perce, who had enjoyed a good deal of
four-ale during the day, and had a jugful of it now at his elbow,
collapsed at sight of her. He bayed a little, but with an expression of
admiring wonder that gave Sally her best tribute. Mrs. Perce, the
expert, nodded. She had received a letter in the morning from Madame
Gala. So to her all the news was known. All the same, Sally spent a
happy couple of hours in the flat, and collected her outdoor clothes
with unwillingness. Each time she had been to see Mrs. Perce she had
felt more strongly than of old the contrast between her always-cheerless
home and their warm, prosperity-laden atmosphere. The recognition acted
powerfully upon her. It was the creation in her mind of a standard of
physical comfort, as the visit to Madame Gala had created a standard of
decorative colour. She was frowning at the new perception as she left
the house, and was half-absorbed in her consciousness of it.

The feeling did not prevent her, at first with a sharp tingling of
surprise, and then, as she grasped the significance of the fact, a start
of emotional disorder, from seeing a familiar figure in the light of the
Supply Stores. Her heart jumped, and began to flurry in her breast. The
figure she saw was that of Toby. He stood a little to the side of the
Stores, watching the doorway from which Sally came. As she flinched, he
came across the road. Sally pretended not to notice him, and knew that
he was following her. But Toby made no attempt to speak to her while
they were in the light of the shops. She saw that he had his cap pulled
very low down over his eyes, and that his hands were not in his pockets,
but hanging loose. He was dressed in a rough dark tweed suit, and looked
like a fighter, but not a professional boxer. His carriage was clumsy,
but light. His dark face was marked by a sort of determination--not
bravado, not impudence, but a solid resoluteness. His eyes she had never
properly seen. His mouth was large, but the lips were thin; the nose was
coarse, but not big. He was ugly, but he was very obviously strong. He
was not tall, but was very sturdily built, and gave the air of
considerable strength. As he followed her she could hardly keep from
looking back; it was only with a great effort that she kept her eyes
forward, and as she turned into Grove Road she increased her pace. Sally
knew quite well what he would do. He would wait until she had passed the
block of shops and had come to the comparative darkness of the houses
beyond. Then he would walk abreast and speak to her. And while she tried
to think what to do her heart was strangling her. She was so excited
that her breath was coming almost in sobs. She was excited, but she did
not therefore feel at his mercy.

It happened as Sally had foreseen. As soon as she was past the shops she
heard his urgent voice at her elbow--"Sally!" For a moment she ignored
it. Then she turned, very coldly, and with a slight sneer looked at him.
They were side by side now. He was keeping step with her as easily as he
could have kept step with a child. "Sally," he repeated. Sally stopped
dead.

"What are you following me for?" she asked, viciously. "Why can't you
leave me alone? Following me like that! I never heard of such a thing."

"I been waiting outside for you all the time. I've had no grub. I
followed you from the house. I saw you start out just as I was getting
home."

"Well, what of it? I didn't ask you to follow me, did I?" demanded
Sally. But in the darkness of the street her eyes softened. Her heart
swelled at the thought that he had waited for her in the Hornsey Road
for fully two hours. Toby took her defiance as a matter of course. He
was still standing doggedly before her, and as she began once again to
walk rapidly in the direction of home he followed her, half a step
behind. At the darkest part of the road he put out a hand to check her
progress. Sally snatched away her arm, but he had been prepared for
that, and caught her immediately. He held her, panting, as she pressed
against a big stone gate-post.

"Let me be!" cried Sally, hoarsely and breathlessly. "Let me be." She
did not scream. She was too impressed by his exhibition of strength. He
continued to hold her, and they stood breast to breast, Sally panting,
and Toby with a kind of stolid determination.

"Will you come for a walk quietly?" he asked, jerking his head.

"No," said Sally, "I won't." There was no mercy, no humility. Only a
hard defiance.

"Yes, you will." He pulled her towards him, so that Sally could not
escape. She was now wholly within the circle of his arm, not struggling,
but with her poor thin arms staving him off. Her body was tense. But she
made no sound, and if there were any passers they knew that this was
only a typical lovers' tiff, common to the neighbourhood, and largely a
matter of physical strength and feminine vituperation. "Yes, you will.
See? Come on, Sally."

"You let me go," she demanded.

"Say you'll come. I'll let you go the moment you say that."

Sally hesitated, then bowed her head in a slow acquiescence. He released
her, and she ran; but he easily overtook her, and she was once again
held, still with her back to a pillar. Both were now breathing hard.
Sally's head was lowered. She was suffocating. She seemed to be in
complete darkness. And she had no sense of what was happening. The mere
technique of the row absorbed her. They were almost like two quarrelling
cats, both sullen, both glowering and full of resentment rather than
burning anger.

"Will you come?" asked Toby. "Just for a walk. Half an hour."

"What d'you want me to come for?"

"Want to talk to you."

"Yes, well, I don't want to talk to you. Understand?" Sally was suddenly
trembling with a passionate rage. Her voice quivered as she spoke, and
the words tumbled out in a savage incoherence.

"I'm going to talk to you. So you may as well make up your mind to come.
You don't want to stand here all night, do you?" He was as savage as
she, and more grim. Sally made an attempt to escape, and was further
pinned. He was breaking down the defence of her tired arms. One of his
knees was against her leg. She was slipping, slipping, and her resolve
to fight against him was fading as rapidly in her sense of the physical
contact. She burst into tears. For an instant he loosed her, at that,
but as she sobbingly began to run away he resumed his former hold,
pressing her against him, a broken little girl, and no longer the
triumphant Sally of the morning. Her hand was to her eyes, and she was
biting her lip to restrain her sobs. Toby put his free hand up and
touched hers, held it, drew it away from her wet face.

"Sally," he said. "I want you. Don't cry, Sally."

His arm tightened. His face was close. Although she turned away her
head, and tried to wrench herself free, Sally knew his lips were
relentlessly following her own. She was conscious of all the joy of
surrender, incapable of moving from those strong arms, incapable of
avoiding his kiss. Her eyes closed, her heart rose; she was limp in his
embrace, not as yet returning his caresses, but accepting them with a
feeling of miserable thankfulness. Her hat was tilted back, and she felt
his cheek against hers, his body against her own. How long they stood
she did not know; but at last she put her hands up, put them round his
neck, and feverishly kissed him, welcoming this joy that was half pain.

"D'you love me?" she asked breathlessly.

They were alone in the dark street, in the invisible world; and she had
never been so happy. So at last Toby had his way, and they walked about
the streets for an hour, until it was long past the time when Sally
should have been in bed. Only then did they part, and Sally was
half-undressed when she heard Toby passing upon his way upstairs. Her
cheeks were burning, her eyes shining, her heart exultant. Sometimes,
as she lay wakeful during the long night, she was so happy that she
could hardly breathe. But a moment came when happiness seemed
overwhelmed in a poignance of emotion that resembled rather a terrible
apprehensiveness, and it was then that Sally felt the tears trickling
from her eyes. It was only the reaction from excessive joy; but she was
deeply affected. She longed again for Toby's arms to be round her,
pressing her face into the pillow to comfort herself with the pretence
that he was still there. Exhausted, she slept.


xvi

All the next day she could not work for preoccupation with her
happiness. She was mad with it, and reckless in her madness. It even,
when rebuke came from Miss Jubb, gave her courage to mention Madame
Gala. And that was a further cause for delight, since Miss Jubb's mouth
dropped open at the news and she could hardly speak to her two girls for
the rest of the afternoon. Sally, chuckling to herself, and every now
and then grimacing at May Pearcey, abandoned herself to anticipations of
the evening. She would see her dear Toby, would show how much she loved
him, would feel herself loved, would hear and say all the little secrets
they had never spoken until now. She would know at last what it was to
be in love, and with the man who loved her. How wonderful it was! What
joy! What fun! Sally could not conceal her grin of happiness. Her white
face was as if it had become plump, so immediately did happiness
transfigure her. And she looked at silly old Miss Jubb, and soppy May,
and thought how they had no lovers. May had her boys--she could keep
them. Sally had Toby. Toby was not a boy: he was a man. He shaved; she
had felt the roughness of his chin. May's boys looked as if they had
smooth faces, or if they shaved it made their skins powdery. Miss Jubb
had never had a boy at all, she shouldn't think. You couldn't fancy Miss
Jubb as a young girl. She must be quite old--as old as Sally's
mother--perhaps forty. But ma had been unlucky to strike dad. He had
never been any good. Not like Toby. Toby was getting almost a pound a
week already, he said; and when he was older he would have lots of
money, and never be out of a job, because he worked with his hands, with
engines, and a man who understood engines would never want for work. He
was twenty, and he kept himself. He just took his meals with his aunt,
and lived in his own room the rest of the time. How she would like to
see his room. She longed for them both to get older. But she wanted to
get on herself, first. She thought: if Toby's out all day, and we just
have a little home, I shall be able.... She thought she might be a
dressmaker herself, and employ twenty hands, and have a waiting-room
that was all grey-blue. She had told Toby about Madame Gala, and how he
could come to fetch her Saturdays, and they'd have the afternoons
together. Sally was brimming with plans.

In the middle of them there came a knock at Miss Jubb's door. Miss Jubb
went, thinking it might be a customer. But she came back again in a
minute, with a face even longer than it had been since she heard Sally's
news. She could hardly speak, but stood against the dingy door, which
she held closed, and swallowed quickly before she could say a word.

"Sally dear, there's a man here from the hospital. Get on your hat and
coat, there's a good girl. He says your mother's been taken there. She
turned dizzy just now when she was crossing the road, and was knocked
down by a van, and run over. She's asking for you, Sally. You're to go.
It's not serious, he says. So don't worry about it. You're just to go
and see her."

Mother? Ma knocked down by a van! Sally was on her feet in an instant.
As Miss Jubb went out again to glean further details from the man, Sally
struggled into her hat and coat. She turned with a callousness which
showed that she did not in the least realise what might have happened,
and addressed the startled and gaping May.

"We may not be princesses," she said with a sort of wild gaiety; "but we
do see life!"


xvii

After she had seen her mother in the hospital Sally was again aware of
that sinking feeling of having time to fill--a feeling of emptiness of
immediate plan,--which she had felt in Hyde Park on the Monday. At seven
she was to see Toby outside the house. It was not yet five. What was she
to do? Not go back to Miss Jubb's, that was certain! Her mother had been
lying in a cot in a big ward, and her arm was bandaged, and she said
both her legs felt as though they had red-hot nails in them; but she was
conscious, and they had told her she would soon be about again. Sally
was to see Mrs. Roberson and tell her the news, and to go to two other
places to let them know that Mrs. Minto would not be able to come for a
time. And she was to be a good girl, and not worry, but to take the
three shillings and ninepence which was in Mrs. Minto's purse, and look
after herself, and explain to the landlady what had happened.... She had
a host of things to do, and she paid her three calls within ten minutes.
So far the question of money had not troubled her. She did not think
that three shillings and ninepence was very little to live on for
perhaps a month. Her emotions at the moment were so blithe that all she
perceived in herself was a sense of liberty. Ma would not be worrying
her every minute she was indoors to do this or that, and not to do the
other. Ma would not be talking all the time about her head. Ma would not
be watching her, asking what she was doing, playing the policeman,
grumble, grumble, grumble. It was a fine liberation for Sally. That was
the way in which she saw it.

Her first shock was when she arrived home and found her own breakfast
dishes still strewn about the table as she had left them, the fire
unlighted and the old ashes still lying in the grate and upon the
hearth, the bed unmade. She was sobered. She first of all found the oil,
filled the lamp, and set a match to it. Then she swept the hearth and
carefully made a small fire. The coal-blocks took a long time to catch,
as they always did, and they quickly burned dull. Upon them she set a
kettle, washed the dishes in cold water, and laid the table for tea. The
kettle took a century to boil, and she knelt close to the fire, warming
herself and waiting for the first spiral of steam. Everything now made
her feel splendid. She invented a game that she was married to Toby, and
that she was expecting him home; so that for this evening all her work
was thoroughly done. Even the bed was made with care. And when she had
finished tea she cleared away, and spread a little old red cloth upon
the table, and once more snuggled close to the puny fire. As she did so
all her thoughts were for Toby. Already she began to listen for him,
although it was long before his time. Thought of her mother's accident
did not disturb her at all. Thought of the future was abandoned. Only
the sweet delight of being with Toby again was her incessant reverie.

At last she heard him, and started to her feet. Her impulse was to run
to the door and whisper to him at once; but on the way thither she
checked herself. Some scruple of prudence, lest he should think her too
eager for him, made Sally allow the steps to pass on up the stairs. But
for all that she watched the clock, and listened almost passionately for
any sound from above. The fire died. She put on her coat and hat,
standing near the fireplace to catch the last waves of heat, with her
foot upon the fender and her eyes fixed upon the purplish glow, so
rapidly fading to mauve and to grey. She was tense with expectancy. She
had no consciousness of anything but her strained hearing.
Tick-tick-tick. The clock raced on, but the hands all the time appeared
to remain still, by so much did her eager heart outstrip them.

Then there was a thud upstairs, as of a door closed; and quick steps
sounded in Toby's room. He stayed there a few minutes, his feet moving a
little, and Sally guessed that he was washing himself. Then, noisily, he
came down the stairs and left the house. He was barely past the door
when Sally blew out the lamp; but she stood mutely in the darkness for
more than a minute afterwards. Only when her own patience was gone did
she obey her impulse and follow him, creeping down the stairs in the
subdued brown light of the house. Out of doors all was black. She peered
for Toby. He was there just under the lamp at a few yards distance, and
she saw him move farther away at her approach. That action, and the
sense of him, gave Sally the most extraordinary tremor of excitement and
happiness, and her cheeks grew warm. She greeted him with the lightest
touch of the arm, and felt in return his hand to her elbow. They walked
without speech to the end of the road, and by common impulse to a dark
turning where at this time of the evening they knew there would be no
passers; and there Toby caught her in his arms. There was no moon, and
no sound in the street. They were entirely alone, and separated from the
rest of mankind by an impassable wall of obsession. They stood pressed
close to one another, kissing from time to time, and did not speak. They
had at first nothing to say, but there was no shyness between them. They
were absorbed in this physical contact. But after some time Sally told
him her news, and made him tell her what he had done during the day, and
felt a great proprietary interest in him all the while. They spoke in
low tones, lovers and amorous lovers even in the middle of humdrum
confidences. Toby was shocked about Mrs. Minto--far more shocked than
Sally had been or could have been; but she airily reassured him in her
first delicious abandonment to a sense of common life. She said "Oo,
she's all right. Quite comfortable. More than if she was at home. And
it's nicer for me, being alone. See, she grumbles at me--always at
it--what Mrs. Roberson says, and about her head, and what I ought to do,
and that. 'Tisn't that there's really anything to grumble at; only, you
know, it's her nature. I never grumble. That's one thing about me.
Doesn't matter _what_ happens, I never ... you know ... keep on at it,
like mother does. What's the good? Crying won't do any good, or
grumbling either. I shall be happier while she's away--do what I like.
Be on my own."

"Won't you be lonely?" Toby asked.

"Not with you. Different if I hadn't got you. But if I get frightened I
shall just yell for you; and I shall think of you all the time,
upstairs, and wonder if you're thinking of me. Will you be?"

"Course I shall," Toby swore, hugging her until she gasped. "All the
time."

"Will you? It's nice to have somebody to ... you know, like you."

"Is it?" he asked gruffly.

"Don't _you_ feel like that?" she asked artfully. Her reward, another
choking hug, was immediately forthcoming. "You _are_ strong," Sally went
on, and with a sense of daring and ownership and pride felt his arm for
muscle. "I'm strong. In a way. Not massive, or anything of that kind. I
can stand a lot. Mustn't think I'm weak because I'm small; but.... Well,
you know what I mean."

"Strong, but got no strength," suggested Toby. Sally shook him,
chuckling proudly at his wit and will to tease. It was like shaking a
tree, so immovable was he by the exerted strength of her weak arms.

"Saucy!" she said. "Though I s'pose it's what I meant. Toby, you do like
... you know ... _this_?" she suddenly asked, not bent upon a caress,
but in a sudden doubt. Her arms were warmly about his neck as she spoke.
Toby left her no doubt. He was not talkative; he had no ready flow of
compliment; but he could speak the language which a young girl in love
best understands. He could crush her almost to ecstatic forgetfulness in
his vigorous arms. Thus embraced, Sally was in Paradise, and her one
desire was to remain there, in a sort of annulment of every other
interest; but even in Paradise she found her thoughts irrepressible. So
she chattered on, while Toby grunted or did not say anything, or
occasionally grew marvellously glib and told something about his work,
or an anecdote about himself which she sometimes thought he must have
read somewhere. And ever and anon they were lost in silence, and their
closeness to one another, and their long breathless kisses, which made
Sally lean her forehead against Toby's breast and enjoy exquisitely the
sense of being weaker than he and of surrendering all her will to his.

If it had not been so cold they might have stood in this way for the
whole evening; but the wind was searching, and presently they began to
walk along, he with his arm about her so closely that they walked almost
with one motion. Toby smoked his cigarettes, and when he wanted one he
put his left hand in his pocket, and drew out a cigarette, and Sally
felt for his matches, and struck one, and held it for him, and received
smoke in her face, and blew the match out, and received a kiss, Toby all
the time never ceasing to hold her within his right arm. She wished
there were more cigarettes, so much did she enjoy the sense of intimacy.
Sometimes she could not resist the temptation to put her arm round
Toby's waist, and give him a little private hug of her own, to show how
happy she was. She loved the darkness more and more, because it made her
bolder. And the sky was so dark that the lamps were like small nickers,
and if anybody passed it was impossible for a face to be seen. And Sally
was alone in this dream world with Toby. She wished it might continue
like this for ever, night and day, beautifully quiet and secret, with
Toby all the time loving her as much as he did now. It was lovely. It
was lovely. She was happy. She did not feel tired or cross or mean or
worldly any longer; but only happy, and full of love.

At last they heard a clock striking eleven, and Sally gave a jump.

"Mercy! Eleven o'clock. Must go home. Good job mother's not there. Else
she'd be asking questions." She laughed as she spoke. "She'd want to
know something. I shouldn't half have a time. 'Eleven o'clock: where you
been?' I shouldn't mind. I'd take no notice. I don't take any notice of
her, because ... you know ... it encourages her if you take any notice.
Oo, the way she keeps on. You wouldn't believe. Drive me to drink, it
would, if I had it all the time. But she's not there...." Sally hugged
Toby. "Isn't it lovely! Nobody to grumble. Nobody to mind what time I
get in.... Well, you know what I mean. I must go in now." But when it
came to the moment of parting she clung to him. "I don't want to go. I
don't want to go," she cried. "It's been so nice, and I've been so
happy." To her horror she felt that she had begun to cry. With an effort
she pulled herself free. "Well, I suppose I _must_. And you'll think of
me, won't you? Just downstairs. And I'll think of you, and wish you were
there.... Oh, fancy me saying that! Toby...." She was passionately
serious. "Say you love me!"

"Love you!" said Toby.

She turned and waved to him when she was a few steps away, flew back to
his arms, and stayed there for a few minutes. Then, this time with more
resolution, she ran towards home, letting herself in with a sense of
brazen guilt at her lateness, and treading softly up the stairs. When
she was in the room, she shuddered a little, at the cold, and in her
excitement. Then she lighted the lamp and looked at herself in the
mirror--at her bright, betraying eyes, at her mouth, which was also
betraying, and at her hair and cheeks and brows and hands. She was
laughing, but not aloud. Her laughter was the mirth of happy excitement.
And, still so happy, she began to undress; and then thought she would
make herself a cup of tea. So she finished undressing while the kettle
boiled, and was sitting up in bed drinking her tea when she heard Toby
go upstairs. His movements made her start, and the tea dribbed over the
side of the cup. Into her head suddenly came a memory of her own words:
"And I'll think of you, and wish you were there."

"And so I do," she suddenly whispered. "So I do. Oh, I'm wicked. I'm
wicked!" She was trembling, and forgetting everything, her eyes fixed
upon the wall vaguely grey before her, outside the pale ray of the lamp.
Mechanically, she sipped again, and the tea ran warmly into her throat.
"No, I'm not wicked," Sally argued. "I'm not. 'Tisn't wicked to love any
one like I do Toby. It's wonderful. Fancy me in love! And Toby ... well,
liking me. Oo, he is strong and big. Wonder if he's brave? I should
think so. You couldn't be as strong as him and not be brave. Oh, I love
him." She remembered their caresses, unembarrassed and exulting. She
knew what it was to be loved. She knew ... she knew everything.
Everything that made people love each other and want to be always
together. Her mind persistently went on kneading into a general memory
the detached memories of the evening, and she was excited and full of
longing for Toby. Slowly she drank her tea, without thinking of it at
all, but accepting its comfort. Her shoulders began to feel cold, and
she shivered as she finished the cup.

Sally slid out of bed to replace the cup and to put out the lamp. As her
hand was outstretched she thought she heard a faint noise, but a
moment's startled listening reassured her. It had been nothing. She
lowered the wick, and blew out the remaining small blue rim of light.
Another instant, and she would have been back in bed, snuggled down in
the warmth. But at that instant she heard a further sound, this time the
turning of the door handle. She froze with sudden dread. In the darkness
she could see nothing.

"Who's there?" she whispered.

The door must slightly have opened. She could now see it open in the
gloom.

"Sally."

It was Toby. Joy took the place of fear. He was inside the door, and
she was in his arms, and the door was closed again behind them.

"My dear," Sally was saying, in a thick little caressing voice. "My
dear."

"Had to come," mumbled Toby, hoarsely. "Thought of you all alone. I
wanted you. See, I had to come."

"Of course you did," murmured Sally, her spirit leaping up and up in
tempestuous excitement. "Toby, you do love me? You _do_ truly love me?"

She had no sense then of anything but her love for him and his love for
her. She was carried right past caution and thought. She was in his
arms, and she was happy. And Toby, a dim figure of burly strength, was
kissing her until she was blinded and choking with excitement beyond all
she had ever felt. Everything conspired to affect her--all suppressions,
all knowledges, all curiosities and vanities. Nothing but caution could
have restrained her, and caution was forgotten. She was vehemently moved
and beyond judgment or reflection. Her one desire was to give herself to
the man she loved, the man who loved her. And the opportunity was upon
them as they were in the first fever of their passion.




BOOK TWO: GAGA


i

Ten days later, Sally began her work with Madame Gala. She arrived
punctually, but found Nosey before her, keeping a record of arrivals.
She also found one or two other girls, who stared at her in an
inquisitive fashion and went on talking among themselves. Only when a
forewoman--Miss Summers--arrived did the big room take on any air of
being used for work, and within five minutes all the girls were in a
state of preparation. Sally saw that they all had sleeved pinafores or
overalls; she had none. As she had not a farthing to buy material to
make such a thing, and had only a couple of slices of bread and
margarine in her coat pocket for lunch, and would have to walk all the
way home, Sally could not fight against the chilling of her heart which
quick glances about the workroom produced. The girls were of all sorts
and sizes, some of them smartly dressed and coiffed; others wearing
clothes less expensive even than her own, and with a general air of not
knowing how to make the best of themselves. Looking round at the faces
she could see none that indicated cleverness or special intelligence.
One ferrety-looking little thing seemed as though she might be either
sharp or half-witted; a tall dark girl who was rather pretty and had
beautiful hair used her hands with assurance; but observation did not
make Sally feel ashamed of herself or of her ability. These girls could
do almost as they were told, but not quite. But the pinafore was a
serious question. Sally had never been used to such a thing. She had not
even brought an apron.

While the others settled down, whispering among themselves and looking
sharply at Sally, the forewoman, after a greeting, ignored her until she
had attended to all that was more important. In her hands was the giving
out of work. Sally saw that she was supposed to know what each girl
could do. She also saw that some girls were favourites and others not.
If she were to make progress here she must be a favourite. She must show
quickly that she had the brains and could work well. It took a very
short time to make her realise that. For a moment she was inclined to be
over-confident; but that mood collapsed before a side glance and a
titter from two of the girls. Their instinctive ridicule warned and
stiffened Sally. They did not know her. She would have to prove her
qualities. She then concentrated upon Miss Summers, watching how she
turned, how she smiled and frowned, and how she explained what had to be
done to each girl who was receiving new work. Miss Summers was a short
stout woman with cat's eyes and a long nose. She licked her lips like a
cat. She was inconsistent and short-tempered; but Sally afterwards found
that while she was extraordinarily vain she was rarely unkind. But in
general she was severe, because severity was the only course to pursue
with these chattering girls, who were full of scratches and jealousies,
and who would have taken advantage of weakness with rapid
unscrupulousness. So the little stout woman, feline and easily
exasperated, was a good person to control the room. Her kindness might
be part of her vanity, but it was not assumed. She loved her work, and
she was always glad to praise good work from the girls, and to encourage
it by favouritism to good workers. It was not the pretty ones or the sly
ones who were the favourites. It was the workers. Following each girl
with her eye, Sally could not observe that at the beginning; but it did
not take her long to add it to her now formidable collection of facts.

When at last Sally was called to Miss Summers's side, and questioned,
she walked the length of the room feeling as though her legs had no
joints, and as though her shoulders were fixed. There were only eleven
girls in the room besides herself, but they were all looking at her. And
when she stood before Miss Summers in her little black dress she looked
so slight, with her slim body and thin pale face, that several of the
girls went on with their work again immediately, having lost interest in
her. Sally, confronted by Miss Summers's cat-like eyes, which were a
gooseberry green, twisted her fingers, and blurted out:

"I'm sorry, I got no pinafore. I didn't know I had to have one."

She was relieved when Miss Summers smiled and licked her lips.

"Well, let's make you one for a start-off. Shall we?"

Sally could have fallen down, so astonished was she at this retort.
Still she blurted further:

"I got no money for the material."

Again Miss Summers smiled. She might almost have given a purr. She
rubbed her cold nose with the back of her hand, like a cat washing its
face.

"That's all right," she said. "We'll find some stuff. It can come off
your wages. I want to see what you can do, d'you see? And that's as good
a way as any. I shall be able to notice how you do it, and give you a
word of advice if you want it. And you won't waste much time, and you
won't waste much material. And so why not? Just stand here while I get
the length." As she measured the length of Sally's frock, and allowed a
few additional inches for the pinafore, she sharply said in a low voice
that only Sally could hear: "That's right: never use scent. It's
vulgar. From the look of you I was afraid you'd use scent and be saucy.
But I'm glad you aren't."

"Oh, no, miss," answered Sally. Quite truthfully, she added: "I've never
thought of using scent. I don't like it. Only common girls use it."
Unconsciously she was emphasising all her sibilants.

"Well, some of the girls here do," said Miss Summers. "Hold still."

The pinafore was a simple matter for both Miss Summers and Sally; and
before the morning was over Miss Summers had visited Madame Gala.

"The new little girl's a quick worker," she said. "Very clever. I think
she'll be very useful."

At which Madame Gala raised her straight brows and looked piercingly at
Miss Summers. If Sally could have heard and appreciated the speech as
Madame Gala did she would have known that she had become a favourite at
a bound. She did not even guess it, so absorbed was she in deserving
commendation, until the end of the week, when she received her full
wages, without deduction. She was tempted. How easy to say nothing, and
take the risk of it being remembered! She could easily say she was sorry
she had forgotten all about it. Then some strong impulse of honesty made
her go up to Miss Summers.

"You haven't taken off the money for the pinafore," she whispered.

"That's all right," said Miss Summers. "Good girl to come to me about
it."

Good girl! Sally wondered if she really was such a very good girl.


ii

She was not, morally, being a very good girl; for her mother was still
in the hospital, and she and Toby were taking risks. So far there had
been no discovery; but they were getting bolder, and only the day before
going to Madame Gala's, when his aunt had been out for the afternoon and
evening, Toby had had Sally to tea in his aunt's room, and they had sat
together over a good fire, and had silently made love to each other for
hours. The more love-making they had, the more they wanted, and Sally
had been living all the week for the time she spent with Toby. But her
mother would be coming home soon, even though she would be unable to
work; and both knew that the wild ecstasy would end with her return. It
was that, probably, which made them less careful, or, if not less
careful, at any rate less cautious in the use of their opportunity.
Sally had a dread, which she would not face, and if Toby had any dread
he never told her. For all her feeling of intimacy with him, Sally never
reached below his manner and his strength; and her ignorance of him it
was that gave the whole relation its charm for her. He was mysterious, a
compelling strength outside her, a strange man who responded to all her
wishes and who loved her as she wished to be loved--brutally and
dominatingly. She was dazzled and infatuated. But already, in her first
days with Madame Gala, she had recovered sufficient of her old coolness
to be set upon definite personal success. This was her strongest
impulse. Her love was outside it, a gratification now, and not a
torment. She had no sense whatever of wrong-doing; only of hostility to
her mother because her mother's return would interrupt the tenour of her
life. Once only she said to Toby, secure in her trust of his love and
care: "Toby ... if I have a baby, you'll ... you'll marry me, won't
you?" And Toby gave her the necessary promise in obvious good faith.
Neither, therefore, troubled about the future. They were both too
anxious to live only in the exhilarating present.

But at last Mrs. Minto returned, and by that time Sally was living upon
money borrowed from Mrs. Perce, her one friend and protector. Mrs. Minto
could not work. She wrote to Aunt Emmy, and Aunt Emmy helped her from
her prizewinnings, and for several weeks they were thus enabled to stave
off want. Once Mrs. Minto was back at home the old order of parsimony
was revived, and it cost them very little to keep life going on from day
to day. Sally's seven shillings a week helped. And at last Mrs. Minto
was allowed to go out, and Mrs. Roberson took her back. Slowly,
half-starving, they managed to exist. Sally still had her evenings with
Toby, with their glory dimmed; and as the weeks went on she knew that
she was safe from the causes of her dread, and carried herself jauntily,
and she began to earn a little extra money by working in the evenings
for Miss Jubb. This meant that she saw Toby less often, and Toby now had
a man friend from the works where he was employed, and was sometimes
with this man Jackson. Sally had her seventeenth birthday: her figure
had improved, and so had her appearance. She was still meagre, because
she had not enough to eat; but some compensation of Nature allowed her
to maintain her health and to mature.

One day, when she had gone to practise upon Mrs. Perce's piano, as she
had not done all the time they had been away from the flat, Sally
attracted Mrs. Perce's attention by singing unusually well. Her friend
listened; and then looked into the room.

"What's that you're singing?" she demanded. "Suits you. You'll never be
able to play the piano, Sally, because you'd have to practise every day
for hours to do that; but you've got a big voice for your body. I
suppose your lungs are good. Ever heard me sing? It's like a baby
crying. But that song 'The Love Path' suits you. You might do something
with your voice. Not much, I expect; but something. You just try and get
hold of somebody who knows about such things. Might do a turn on the
Halls. You never know. If I come across anybody I'll ask them; but I
don't see many people now, and what I do are all in the 'public' line.
It's worth thinking about, for a girl like you, with your way to make.
Unless you marry, of course; and you say you're not going to do that in
a hurry. So there you are. Make the most of yourself, I say; and let the
Devil go hang himself if he's a mind to it."

Sally, who had never thought of such a thing, promised. For a time she
was flattered by the vision of singing to audiences. But that soon
faded. She met nobody outside Madame's, except for one or two young men
who spoke to her on the way home; and so she kept to her sewing and
machining for Miss Jubb. It pleased her to be able to tell Toby, who,
however, frowned, and did not seem pleased.

"Seems to me you're always thinking you'll do something wonderful," he
said sourly. "Doesn't seem to come to much, as fur as I can see."

"Oh, doesn't it!" cried Sally. She shook herself free from him, and
marched off in anger. And Toby did not follow. It was a tiff. By the
next evening both were contrite, and the matter was never spoken of
again. All the same, Sally remembered it. She remembered it the more
unforgivingly because Toby's remark had been true. Nothing so far had
happened to prove definitely that her confidence in exceptional powers
was justified. He was jealous of her! Sally laughed almost scornfully.
Fancy a big fellow like Toby being jealous of a little thing like her.
Men! They were all alike. All right as long as they were playing first
fiddle! That was it: Toby didn't want her to have a chance at all. He
wanted her always to be number two. Sally shook her head obstinately.

"All right, Master Toby!" she said to herself. There was no more in it
than that--a momentary revolt;--but once the notion had arisen it began
to revolve in her mind. She could not remember if she had ever told Toby
of her plan to be a successful dressmaker; but what would he say to
that? Would he like his wife to make money, and to have real ladies
coming to her as they did to Madam? It seemed from this that he would
not. He preferred to be top dog. Sally was to be nothing upon her own
account--merely to fetch and carry, and do what she was told, and
husband his paltry little earnings. He'd rather be poor than owe
anything to his wife, in case she became bigger than himself. Was that
it? Was that Master Toby's idea? If so, it was not Sally's. She suddenly
understood that Toby thought of her as his wife, as his chattel; and
that she had never ceased, except in the passionate excitement of their
early relations, to think of herself as one who belonged to herself and
was going to make some sort of life for herself. This came as a shock to
Sally. She had never thought of it before. She was beginning to grow up.
From that time she first began to criticise Toby. Until then he had been
the burly man she loved. Her thoughts of him, as her love for him, had
been merely physical. She was now to search more deeply into the needs
of life, still crudely, but examiningly. It was not enough, then, to
love a man if you were going to have something else to do in life
besides love him. The idea was new. It puzzled her. It was something
outside the novelettes she had read, and outside her own precocious
thoughts. Love was love--all knew that. She loved Toby; she had given
herself to him; they were practically married; and now it appeared that
something was wrong somewhere. Toby did not want her to be Sally: he
wanted her to be just a sort of moon-Toby. Another girl would have
wanted nothing better. Sally told herself that she was different. She
went out by herself, one evening, instead of working; and walked up to
Highgate. And as she went up the hill she sang to herself the ballad
"The Love Path." It began:

  "When you and I go down the love path together,
  Birds shall be singing and the day so long,"

and she could play the simple accompaniment to it with very few
mistakes. She remembered Mrs. Perce's words. What if she _could_ do
something with her voice? Did she sing well? She allowed herself to
glimpse another glorious future.

In the middle of the walk Sally stopped dead.

"Oh, _doesn't_ it...." she said aloud. "Well, we'll just _see_. We'll
just see about it. That's all." And having as it were made her formal
protest she resumed the journey, and arrived home tired out, ready for
bed; and before she had been in bed more than two minutes she was fast
asleep, dreaming of motor cars and footmen standing on the pavement with
fur rugs in their hands. In her dream she was alone in the cars. Even
the chauffeur had no smallest resemblance to Toby. And yet she still
loved him with all her heart, and when she was with him she felt that
she extraordinarily belonged to him. Love had again at last encountered
ambition, and battle was joined.


iii

Dreams of luxurious motor-cars, and footmen with fur capes and long
fawn-coloured overcoats, holding fur rugs to cover her knees, were now
constant in Sally's mind. She saw such things occasionally in Regent
Street, and loved to look in at the windows of motor broughams
upholstered in fawn-coloured corduroy, with arm straps and little
hanging vases of fresh flowers. The freshness of these cars was her
delight. She had no notion of the income it was necessary to have in
order to possess such cars, with their attendant footman and chauffeur;
but that income, whatever it was, became her ideal. Money! Lots of
money! With money you could have comfort. When she said that, and was
warned by conventional wiseacres that money did not produce happiness,
she sneered at the timid ones. "Bet _I'd_ be happy," she said. "What's
happiness?" She wondered what it was. For her it had been oblivion in
Toby's arms. It was so no longer. That was not all she desired. It was
not by any means all. And she shrank more and more strongly from a life
of squalid toil such as her mother had had--such as she would still have
had if Mr. Minto had been a sober man. All her life she had slaved and
slaved, and now she was worn out with it. Not for Sally! She had other
plans. She had gone to the West End, and the West End was in her blood.
She was looking round at life with some of her old calculating
determination to exploit it. The death of her father, the passion for
Toby,--these had distracted her. With increasing confidence in her
position at Madam's, and a new sense of what money could actually do in
the way of procuring food and clothes and ordinary or extraordinary
physical comforts, Sally had returned to her old faith. She began to
have a little money to buy things for herself. Once or twice Miss
Summers gave her quite good-sized pieces of material, and there were
always scraps to be gathered and utilized. And Sally was enabled to
dress carefully. She became the smartest of the girls in the room, for
she had a natural sense of smartness. The other girls did not like her,
but they all envied her and admired her. It was not that she was
unpopular; but that they felt in her the hard determination to get on,
and were resentful of her manifest ability to achieve what she meant to
do.

The other girls were all sorted out in Sally's mind. There was not one
of them into whose nature she had not some biting insight. She had
become so practised that she knew all their dresses (as of course all
the others did, so that a new one was an event), and knew what
everything they owned had cost. She could recognise anything that had
been dyed, any brooch or adornment, any stockings. She would have made a
good house-detective. But she never told tales. If she knew, she knew,
and that was all. It was not for Sally to play the policeman. All
knowledge went into her memory. It would be devastatingly produced on
the occasion of a row, but Sally rarely quarrelled. With her, nothing
ever came to a quarrel. There was no need for it to do so. She was
neither jealous nor censorious. One does not quarrel with one who
neither loves nor blames nor is stupid or too anxious to show
cleverness. Sally merely "was," and the other girls knew it. For this
reason she was not liked, but neither was she feared or unpopular. They
did not hide things from her, but they did not show them eagerly. Sally
was Sally. She enjoyed being Sally. She meant always to be Sally.

And at last there came into Sally's life, when she had been at Madame
Gala's for about six months, a new interest, and a singular one. One
day, when they were all working very hard, and the electric light was
on, Madame came into the workroom with another person. And this person
was a young man with a grey, thin face, rather tall and stooping, with a
hesitating manner, and a general air of weakness. He followed Madame
Gala round the room in an idle way, nodding to several of the girls; and
Sally thought he had a very attractive smile. She found him looking at
herself with a pair of large soft brown eyes, like chocolate which has
been in a warm place. It was a rather dumb look. A little nick came
between Sally's brows. She was busy making an inventory of the young man
visitor's traits, his features, his clothes. He dressed well, and he was
not bad-looking. With more stamina he might have been almost handsome;
but he was obviously not in good health. The stoop, the vagueness of all
his movements, his soft eye, all betokened as much. Sally turned to
Muriel Barrett, who worked next to her.

"Who's he?" she asked, indicating the stranger.

"That's Bertram ... Madame's son. Mr. Merrick, his real name is. But we
call him Gaga."

"Wodjer call him that for?" asked Sally. "Isn't he right in his head?"

"Oo, well one of the gels--she's gone now, Mary Smith,--made it up. She
said he was Mr. Gala, you know. Then she called him Bertie Gaga, for
fun; and it got to Gaga. I never spoken to him, so I don't know. Look
out, he's looking at us. Oo, I believe he's got a crush on you, Sally."

Presently the young man followed his mother out of the room, and there
was a little buzz when they were gone. The girls leaned together, and
whispered, laughing among themselves. Muriel Barrett turned again to
Sally, and became confidential. She herself was a pink, snub-nosed
blonde, with untidy hair, who was always sniffing over her work. She
jerked her head at Rose Anstey, the tall dark girl whom Sally had
noticed when first she came.

"Rose thought he was in love with her once," Muriel said. "Well, he was,
a bit; but not as much as she thought. I mean, he used to look at her,
and all that, but he never give her anything, or took her out. I think
... you know ... she's a bit struck on him. That's more like it. She
thinks he's a very tall handsome man. Well, he's not my taste. Funny, if
you're tall, I s'pose you want a tall man to fall in love with you. It's
different, being small, I suppose. My Elf's only about inch taller than
me. You can't hardly see there's any difference between us. If I've got
my hair frizzed he looks...."

Muriel went on talking. Sally took a glance at Rose, who, with eyes
downcast, was sewing rapidly. Sally wished she had known that about Rose
and Gaga while he was in the room: then she would have been able to look
at Rose and make up her mind about that affair. She did not suppose
really that there was anything in it, either way. Muriel was a little
fool--like a little pink pig. That was just what she was like. And she
chattered like a monkey. She had said that because he looked at her
twice Gaga had got a crush on Sally. Well, Sally didn't mind. He could
have any old crush he liked, for all she cared. Gaga was dismissed from
her immediate attention, although she sometimes recollected a pair of
soft brown eyes, that made her want to say "Moo" as if in response to
their dumb longing.

The outcome of this visit, which occurred towards the end of May, was a
day's outing for the girls at the beginning of June. They all went into
the country by train, on a day which at first promised to be typical of
all days unfortunately chosen for staff outings, but which cheered up
later and became brilliantly fine. Only the girls were there, with Miss
Summers and another forewoman, Miss Rapson, to see that nobody fell
into mischief. They had a good picnic lunch in woods, and ran or walked
or sat about all the afternoon, until it was time for tea. They then
trooped into an hotel in which a room had been engaged, and scrimmaged
for places round a big table. The tea was an enormous meal: Sally, who
had not hitherto enjoyed herself any more than most of the other girls
had noisily done, felt herself grown to twice her normal size. It was
the biggest meal she had ever eaten, and there were cream and milk and
sugar, and there were cakes and lettuce and jam and all sorts of other
encouragements to appetite. And every time anybody laughed the sound
went up to the varnished rafters, and billowed so much that the two
elder women had at last to break in upon a laughter competition. Sally
held aloof from the laughter, scornfully regarding the laughers. She had
been rather serious all day.

And when the noise and fun were at their height Madam and Gaga and
another man and woman came into the room, having motored to the hotel,
taken their tea in another room, and determined to join the party. The
tea had been so late, and so prolonged, that it was already nearly eight
o'clock, and as the sky had grown overcast and the day was drawing to a
close the lights suddenly popped up to illumine the faces of both
feasters and visitors. A piano was opened at the far end of the room,
and the woman who was with Madam sat down at it and began to play. But
only one or two of the girls danced: the others had eaten too much to be
able to do so. Then Rose sang a song, in which she said that her heart
was aching and breaking at somebody's forsaking, and the girls looked at
one another significantly; and there were more songs, and the girls sat
back in their chairs with flushed faces, and each of them in turn seemed
to be doing something to entertain the party. With a bored feeling,
Sally was sipping her last cup of tea, when she became aware that Gaga
had taken the chair next to her, and with his chocolate eyes was looking
pleadingly into her face.

"Don't _you_ sing?" he asked. "I wish you'd sing."

"I got no music," said Sally.

"Mrs. Roach would be able to make an accompaniment. She understands
music very well--if you hummed her a song. I wish you'd sing."

Sally rose to her feet. The other girls all watched her with narrowed
eyes. She was wearing such a pretty dress of light grey cotton poplin
that she looked smarter than ever, they thought--in fact, almost pretty.
She went close to the piano, and spoke to the pianist. "_Oo, swank!_"
whispered the girls, when they saw that Sally was to play her own
accompaniment. It was a thing none of them could have done.

  "'When you and I go down the love path together,
  Birds shall be singing and the day so long....'"

sang Sally, in her clear voice, and made everybody arch their brows in
surprise.

  "'Your heart mine, and mine in your keeping,
  List while I sing to you love's tender song.
    Ah, love, have done with your repining,
    See how the day is clear;
    Heart of my heart,
    On your fond heart reclining
    Dear, oh my Dear....'"

She played with care, and struck no false notes. She sang her best. Her
voice was the best voice of the afternoon, a mezzo-soprano, but with
clear upper register and a fulness that suggested training. It was not
a great performance, but it thrilled the others. Sally had triumphed.
With one accord the girls clapped.

"My best worker," said Miss Summers, rubbing her cold nose and turning
to the accompanist of the afternoon.

"A clever little girl," agreed her neighbour.

But Gaga was stupefied. He had remained in the chair next to Sally's,
and when she resumed her place his mouth was still open with delight and
admiration. Again he leaned forward, and she met his melting chocolate
eyes.

"That was beautiful," he said, in a low tone of commendation.
"Beautiful!"

"Glad you liked it," she said, almost brusquely. Instinctively she shot
a glance in Rose's direction. Rose, her cheeks mantling, was observing
the two with interest. Sally's brain clicked an impression, and she
listened to a stammering from Gaga which aroused her contempt. "He's
hardly a man at all," she thought. "He's soppy. Rose can have him. I
wish her joy of him. She can have him--and twenty like him, if she
wants.... I don't know so much about that. Why should she? She's stuck
up. Why shouldn't I have some fun, if I want to? It's nothing to do with
Rose Anstey what I do, and what Gaga does...."

Her demand was unanswerable, because it was addressed to one who did not
habitually withdraw herself lest she should give pain to others. If Rose
was jealous, that showed the sort of cat she was. And in any case, who
was Rose? Sally was bright in her responses to the soft voice, so that
Gaga was pleased; but the girls could all see that her manner was cool,
and not the flustered eagerness of a beggar. Rose's neighbour whispered.
When the evening was over and Gaga and his mother had gone, and the
girls had all piled into two railway compartments, somebody, whose
voice was unrecognisable in the darkness, called from the other
carriage:

"What price Gaga on the love path? Whey!"

There was great laughter. Even Sally joined in it. Going home, the other
girls in her carriage all insisted upon hearing the song again, and as
they all had the quick ear of Cockneys they could sing it in chorus by
the time the train reached its journey's end. Sally had become, for a
time, the heroine of the occasion. Only Rose, in the other carriage, had
made her protest against the song and its singer.

"Love path!" she said, in a warm voice of indignation. "She's nothing
but a cocket--a white-faced cocket. That's what she is. She nothing but
a white-faced cocket, that Sally Minto!"

From that time onward that was Sally's name among the girls--"Cocket,"
or "White-faced Cocket." Rose had coined the phrase which would stick.
When Sally heard her name the next day, through Muriel's indiscretion,
she looked over at Rose with pinched nostrils and a little dry smile.
She was flattered. The name was the product of Rose's jealousy and
injured vanity; but it was life to Sally, for it was a testimony--the
first she had ever had--to her charm and her dangerousness.


iv

She did not tell Toby the next night about her singing. She rather
carefully refrained from telling him, not out of considerateness, but
from a sort of scorn for his jealousy. To herself she said "Anything for
a quiet life." Toby never dreamed that such a person as Gaga existed,
any more than he guessed at any of Sally's encounters with young men on
the way home. Sally had discretion. Had he been a lover, she might have
told him; but as he was more to her than that she saw no reason to
arouse his jealousy. And really, if a man spoke to her, and looked all
right, where was the harm in letting him walk a little way with her? She
never made appointments, and after a time, when they found she could
take care of herself, and did not want a non-committed male friend,
these fellow-pedestrians soon left her alone. For Sally, each of them
was practice. To mention them to Toby would have been to give them all
too great importance. And he might have made a fuss, and unnecessarily
interrupted her fun. "Where ignorance is bliss," thought Sally, "'tis
folly to call out the guard." And, further, "Let sleeping dogs lie until
the milk is stolen." And so Toby pursued his own path, and never knew a
tenth of what went on in Sally's life and mind. Compared with Sally, he
knew nothing at all. She grew each day more _rusée_, more cunning in
knowledge of the world. And Toby blundered where he should have been
most astute. It was his fate.

Sally told him about the outing, because she saw he was in a gloomy mood
on the day--a Sunday--after the girls' treat. She described it at length
as they walked in Waterlow Park, hanging on to his arm, and all the time
searching his tell-tale face and guessing at the cause of his manifest
depression. She told about the picnic and the woods, and the tea, and
the journey home; and she saw his mouth slightly open as he grunted. She
could see the tiny points of hair that were beginning to make a
perceptible blueness upon his chin, and the moulding of his cheek, and a
little patch of fine down upon his cheek bone, and the hair at his
temples which she had so often kissed. And she knew by his averted eye
that something was the matter with him. She began to try drawing him on
the subject--his aunt, had he heard from his mother (who had married
again when Toby was a baby, and lived with her husband in the North),
what had he been doing at the Works? Ah! That was it. Toby had started,
and frowned. It was something at the Works. Oh, he was easy for Sally to
read!

"What's the matter?" she suddenly asked. Toby flushed and scowled down
at her, very dark and ugly in his irritation, his mouth twisted.

"Matter?" he demanded. "What d'you mean? Nothing's the matter."

"That's why you're so cheerful, I suppose," retorted Sally--"At the
Works, I mean." Toby gave her a quick, angry look in which there was an
admixture of fear and suspicion.

"There's _nothing_ the matter," he said, in a tyrannic voice.

"Have you got the sack?" Sally was merciless. She replied to his
tyrannic voice with one as hard and stabbing as a gimlet. "Ah, I thought
that was it. What you been doing?"

"Nothing," said Toby. "And anyway, what's it to do with you?"

"Well, I'm out walking with you. See? And I got to do all the talking.
See? And if you're going to be surly I'll go home by myself. That's what
it's got to do with me. And, besides, it _is_ something to do with me,
and don't you forget it. You got no right to keep things from me."

Toby was cowed by her handling of him. He might be strong, but brains
are always more potent than muscle in such circumstances. And men are
always afraid of the women they love.

"Yes, I got the push," he defiantly said.

"And what's _that_ for?" demanded Sally, with the severity of a mother
to her baby. There was no answer. "What's _that_ for?" she repeated.
"Come on, Toby, you'll feel better if you tell me about it. Toby, d'you
love me? Well, there's nobody about ... quick!" They kissed, and her
arms had been round his neck, and Toby was her sheepish, scowling,
smiling slave. Sally had a faint consciousness of joy in her power.

"Well, you see...." he began, haltingly. "Jackson and I ... we been ...
well, we wanted to make a bit, you see. And--tiddent _his fault_, but
he...."

"Been pinching stuff," said Sally. "Clumsy. Got found out. Well?"

"Well, they found out about me, too."

"What had _you_ been doing?"

"I never took anything; but I found a lot of old things among the
rubbish, and I showed them to Jackson. Well, they asked him if anybody
had been with him; and he said 'no.'"

"That was all right," Sally said. "I like Jackson."

"But then the man he'd been dealing with said Jackson had talked about
his 'mate.' And they knew that was me. And I ... told 'em a tale."

"_I_ bet!" cried Sally, scornfully. "And got caught in it, too. Badly!"

"Well, they fired us both yesterday, and said we was lucky they didn't
prosecute."

"Did they pay you? What you going to do now?"

"I dunno." Toby stared stubbornly before him. "Get something else, I
suppose. Jackson's going for a sailor. Guess I'll do that, too."

"Go for a sailor?" demanded Sally, with a heart that went dump into her
boots. "What d'you want to do that for?"

"I'd be with Jackson, see, if I went for a sailor."

"And what about me?" Sally's voice was no longer hard or dry. "D'you
want to leave me? Are you tired of me, Toby? I believe you are. Are
you?"

"No, I'm not. And I don't want to leave you. But if I went for a sailor
I'd make a bit of money, perhaps, and then after a little while I could
come back and begin again. It would get over having no reference. They'd
say 'Where you been working?' and I'd say 'Been at sea for the last
year.' Then they wouldn't know anything but what I told 'em. I wouldn't
go long voyages, Sally. Only just short ones. I'd often come home, and
we'd have a spree."

Sally's quick brain was at work. She did not want him to go; but if he
went, and if she saw him often, in spite of his being away, perhaps it
would not be so bad.

"But suppose you got wrecked?" she exclaimed.

"Rot. D'you suppose every ship gets wrecked? Don't be a fool!"

"No. But yours might get wrecked. How am I to know, supposing there's a
storm? It won't not get wrecked because you're on it. Would you come
home very often? Would you wear sailor clothes? Wonder how you'd look!
Oh, I know--you mean a jersey. Would it have letters across your chest?
Where d'you have to go?"

Sally was so interested that she was even making up Toby's mind for him.
By the time they went in it was decided that he and Jackson were going
to sea, and that Sally should be taken down to visit his ship if it
happened to be at the Docks or at Tilbury. She had dancing visions of
Toby in a navy blue jersey, with "Queen of the Earth" or "La Marguerite"
or "Juanita" across it in white letters. She could see his dark hair
blown by the wind, and the veins in his wrists standing out as he hauled
a rope. It was rather fun! she thought. "My boy's a sailor." She would
be able to touch him for luck. Sailors were lucky. She sang to herself
a song one of the workgirls knew:

  "Sailors are lads. Sailors are lads.
  Sailors they make you laugh!"

Before night she was wholly reconciled to the idea that Toby would go to
sea. She soon had a dim perception of the fact that it would do him good
to go. It would get him away from the atmosphere of the Works, where
there seemed to be a lot of stupid larking and work-dodging. Now that he
was dismissed she began to realise all this. She was glad he was away
from it. She was glad he was going to sea. It would be a complete
change. It would do him good. He had been fiddling about too long at the
Works, in his overalls and in the grime and oil and general dodginess of
the place. The ship would take him about, and show him the way people
did things. It would open his eyes and his brains. Electrically,
something self-protective within her added the further message: it would
keep him out of the way for a time. Sally breathed deeply. An unreadable
smile was upon her lips, and no smile at all was in her eyes. Afar off
she scented change; but what manner of change she did not as yet
recognise. It was her instinct at work, her instinct for turning life to
her own advantage. It was an infallible instinct, like that of birds for
a coming storm.


v

It was some weeks before Sally again saw Gaga, and this time he came
into the premises of Madame Gala one Saturday morning. Sally had taken
something in to Madam, and was waiting her judgment, when one door
opened and Gaga came in. He was dressed, as usual, in a morning coat and
top hat, and his trousers were creased to an inconceivable point of
accuracy. Besides which, his tailors had been able to do what most
tailors cannot achieve; the creases arrived at the precise centre of
Gaga's fawn spats. Sally was not such an expert in male clothing to
recognise from this that Gaga's tailors were supermen; but she could
tell that he looked like a gentleman of leisure. She was the more
astonished, therefore, to see him carrying a parcel of some size under
his arm. His mother was evidently quite as astonished.

"What on earth's that, Bertie?" she demanded. Gaga looked at her in a
timid way.

"Oh--er--it's ... it's a new fertiliser," he said. "I.... I'm going to
take it on to the office after lunch. Goodmayes is coming back then.
Perrip says it's wonderful stuff, and I want Goodmayes to go into it.
We're going into all that matter--good morning, Miss Minto--this
afternoon. I.... I think we may be able to get through quite a lot. You
see, as it's Saturday, we shan't be interrupted...."

"That will do, Sally," said Madam, gravely and slowly nodding her head
in dismissal.

Sally went with regret. She had been interested in the conversation. She
had taken it for granted that Gaga did nothing for a living. Now he
talked of going to an office, and of two men whose opinions he evidently
valued, and of fertiliser; and although his words and his manner were
still those of a hesitating man he did not speak as an absolute fool.
Sally felt a stir of curiosity. What sort of business was it that he was
in? Fertiliser ... wonderful stuff ... something to do with gardening,
would it be? As she was closing the door, Sally looked back and saw
mother and son standing together. The likeness was remarkable. Both were
tall, grey-faced, and slightly stooping. Gaga was weak-looking for a
man, and Madam had more severity; but there were such lines upon her
face that she looked like an old woman. A sudden realisation shook
Sally. As she went back to Miss Summers with an explanation of Madam's
deferred judgment she had this sharp new knowledge about Madame Gala.

"Well _she_ won't live for ever," thought Sally, definitely.

And then she had recourse to her usual informant, Muriel, and asked her
Gaga's business. Muriel did not know. Sally was therefore left to
conjecture. She forgot all about Madam and Gaga, for Toby was going to
meet her after business on his first leave from the "Florence Drake."
She was dressed in her most destructive raiment, had searched the skies
for rain, and was watching the clock. So fertilisers went the way of all
secondary things, and Toby became her dominating thought. He had become
the more splendid by his absence. She imagined him standing in the
street below, dressed equally in his best clothes, and looking the
finest boy on earth. They were going into Hyde Park and Kensington
Gardens, and he had promised to take her in a boat on the Serpentine, if
one could be hired, and somewhere to tea, and at night to the
Marlborough Theatre in Holloway Road. It was worth while to lose him for
a time in order to recover a Toby more dear, and so much more
extravagant on her behalf. He explained his generosity by the fact that
he would be drawing his wages that day. Good to be a sailor, and have
your money in a lump like that! Sally thought she would not altogether
mind if he remained at sea for a time. He could save, and she could get
on; and then they would both be happy, with a house somewhere, and a
maid, and everything spick and span. No babies. Sally had taken that to
heart, and she appreciated the value of old Perce's advice. A girl who
wanted to get on did not need babies to drag her down. She wanted
freedom.

As the clock slowly crawled to the hour of liberation all the girls
began to put away their things, so that a real busyness was observable
in the room. Sally was apparently no more eager than the others, and yet
she could hardly keep herself from running to the window to see if Toby
was in the street below. Sedately she prepared to leave, walking down
the stairs slowly instead of rushing at them as she wished to do. She
buttoned her little gloves, and set her hat straight, and made herself
appear nonchalant. And that was how it happened that Gaga overtook her
at the front door, and stood with her for a moment upon the doorstep.

"Lovely day it is," Gaga said, agreeably. "You going to get away?"

"Away? Oh, no, I'm going home," Sally said brightly. Then, looking at
him, she saw that there was nothing to disturb the impression that he
was a gentleman of leisure. "Oh Mr. Ga-- Mr. Bertram ... you haven't got
your parcel!" she cried.

He slapped one hand upon the other, with a most dramatic gesture.

"Idiot!" he exclaimed. "Thank you _so_ much, Miss Minto. You've saved my
afternoon." And with that, raising his top hat, he went back up the
stairs, leaving Sally to congratulate herself upon her memory and her
presence of mind. For she knew the rooms would all be locked by Miss
Summers before she left.

She looked round for Toby, and saw him, as fine as a bird, upon the
opposite path. Crossing over, she took his arm with such pride and
delight that Toby, who had been frowning as he greeted her, was almost
appeased. She looked so charming in her very pale green dress with the
artfully-brimmed hat that he also had looked proud and happy at her
first appearance. But Toby had received a shock. Standing there in his
dark tweed suit, with a rakish Trilby hat and a fascinating cane, he had
felt a fit companion for any girl, and as he was shaven, and his square
face was browned with the sun and the sea wind, he had been content. And
then Sally, looking like a princess....

"Who the devil's that silly fop?" he demanded, jerking his head.

Sally gave a jump, and a mischievous peep up into Toby's brown face.

"Jealous?" she asked. "That's right: be a man. They're never happy
unless they're jealous. That's Gaga. And if you want to know who Gaga
is, he's Madam's son. See?"

"Well, he'd better not come fooling around you," growled Toby. "Or he'll
get a thick ear. With his top hat and his kid gloves and all."

"Hark at it!" jeered Sally. "Quite the little man! Don't you think he's
awfully good-looking, Toby? We're all mad about him. All us girls."

"No, I don't," said Toby, deliberately. "But I expect he's the sort the
girls like. Well, he's got a harem there, and no mistake, all fussing
round him. Is he there all the time?"

"No. Toby, what's fertilisers?" Sally's curiosity had been revived.
"Don't you know? Oh, shut up about Gaga. Anybody'd think he was a devil.
He isn't. He's soppy. He wouldn't dare to make love to any of us girls.
If I was to look at him he'd run away."

"Yes," said Toby, grimly. "I see he didn't like you looking at him."

"Well, I'll tell you something else, Toby," added Sally, with a
persuasively dry candour. "If Madam was to see me looking at him I
should get the sack--spiff! See?"

Toby was impressed. More, he was silenced. They spent a happy afternoon
and evening, with no further reference to Gaga. Nor did Sally think of
Gaga during the whole of the weekend. He might have been mixed and
pounded with his own fertiliser for all she cared. For Sally had Toby.


vi

One night Miss Summers and Sally were working late upon a "rush job,"
and Madam was also in her room. The girls had all gone; but Sally had
been chosen by Miss Summers to help her, and Sally was always ready to
do this because it meant a small addition to her weekly money. Madam was
doing her books, and Gaga was helping her. Sally was sewing
busily--beautiful fine work that caused Miss Summers to purr and lick
her lips with relish;--and as they worked they exchanged remarks which
would have been impossible if they had not been alone. Miss Summers
always spoke of the business, which absorbed her, and Sally gleaned
innumerable details in this way, without seeming to be doing such a
thing. She, on her side, gave Miss Summers a low-toned picture of her
own life, concentrating upon domestic circumstances and enhancing Miss
Summers' respect for her bravery and her willingness. When they had been
silent once for a little while, and Sally had finished the first of her
difficult and gratifying tasks, Sally fell into thought, and at last
said to Miss Summers:

"Wish I knew about accounts. I don't know anything. Is it hard to
learn?"

Miss Summers shook her plump face, and rubbed the tip of her nose with
the back of her hand.

"No," she reassuringly said. "It's easy. You know what twice one are?
Well, that's all it is. You put down on one side how much you charged,
and when you get the money you put it down on the other side, and draw a
line to show they balance. And every month or every quarter you go
through your books, and see who hasn't paid; and if it isn't anybody
special you send them a fresh account. And if it's a real lady you don't
worry her. You have to know who's who in a business like this. That's
the chief thing."

"Does Gaga--Mr. Bertram know who's who?"

"No!" Miss Summers's tone was conclusive. "But his mother tells him who
to write to, or who to send an account to, and he knows book-keeping,
and how much is at the bank; and he draws cheques for her to sign, and
that sort of thing. Between you and me, Sally--mind, this is _quite_
between ourselves,--I don't think Mr. Bertram's got a very good head for
figures. You have to be a bit smarter than he is. Of course, he's very
kind and good-looking; but if I wanted good sound common sense I
wouldn't go to him. Not a good head for figures. He's not very sharp.
Now Madam's as sharp as a needle. It's funny how a really sharp woman
sometimes has a son who's--well, not so sharp...."

"Would you say _I_ was sharp?" asked Sally innocently.

"Like a knife," declared Miss Summers, with a quick dart of her feline
eyes.

"Really?" Sally was eager. She gave a little chuckle of pleasure at such
emphatic praise.

"You'd be able to do the books, but you're better where you are. When
you've been here another three months, Sally, you'll be getting more
money. It isn't only that you're a good worker, and quick, but you've
got more sense than the other girls. I oughtn't to say this to you. I
don't generally praise the girls here. But if you want to get on, you've
only got to stay where you are. You'll find Madam appreciates you. And
so do I."

"You've been awfully good to me," murmured Sally, with downcast eyes.
"I'm not just saying that, Miss Summers; I mean it, every word. When I
came here I didn't know anything; and now I don't know a lot; but...."
She gave a small cluck of her tongue, and a smile to show how much she
had learned. It was true. And she was even learning to speak better,
through listening to Madam and Miss Summers and at times a customer; and
she had enough sense to avoid the extravagant refinements of Nosey.
Presently she resumed: "Miss Summers, what does Mr. Bertram do? He's got
a business of his own, hasn't he?"

Miss Summers looked across at the door leading to Madam's room, and
lowered her voice.

"It's only something Madam put him into. It's a business all to do with
farms."

"Farms?" Sally laughed. "Well, _he_ doesn't look much like a farmer."

"No, it isn't exactly farms; but chemical things they use on farms. Now
you see there's the soil." Sally nodded, so deeply interested that she
ceased her work. "Some soil's good for growing things, and some isn't.
Well, when a soil's not good the farmers mix stuff with it, to make it
better."

"I know," cried Sally, joyously. "Fertiliser."

"Yes. And then from the good soil they'll get a crop early in the year,
and then, by using stuff, they'll get another crop later. All that sort
of thing. And if cows have the mange, or the rickets, or whatever it is
cows have, Mr. Bertram's got something to give them. D'you see what I
mean? And all sorts of chemical things. Stuff to kill weeds, stuff to
give chickens to make them have bigger eggs.... He's got an inventor,
and a manager, and others who are interested in the business, and he's
got a share, and he goes to the office and goes about the country
sometimes." Miss Summers screwed up her nose and lips, looking very like
an old pussy, and in a whisper added: "Doesn't really do very much." She
put her finger to her lips at that, and Sally, resuming her work,
reassured her by a glance. "Of course," said Miss Summers, "he's very
agreeable, and good-looking, and he's got plenty of money."

Money! Sally's eyelids flickered. She gave a charming grin.

"Wish I'd got plenty money," she said.

"You will have," answered Miss Summers, confidently. "Don't fret. Your
time's coming. You're young yet, and all sorts of things might happen to
you."

Sally made no response. She fell into silence for a time. She had learnt
with the greatest interest about Gaga's business, and about the books.
She learned a great deal from Miss Summers, whom she had grown to like
very much. She was by no means insensitive to kindness, although she was
not sentimental over it. And, as she thought, she came round again to
the two workers in the next room.

"D'you think Madam will live long?" she unexpectedly asked.


vii

Within half an hour the job was finished, and Miss Summers took it in to
Madam. She closed the door after her, and so Sally could not hear what
was said. She stood up, stretching her arms, and looking down into the
street, for it was barely growing dusk, and she could see a few men and
women walking along in either direction. She yawned slightly, raising
her hand to her mouth, her muscles stiff. And as she stood thus she
heard the door opened and closed again, and, still yawning, said
sleepily:

"Oo, I'm _so_ tired!"

"Are you?" she heard behind her, in a very soft and sympathetic voice.
Sally wheeled.

"I thought it was Miss Summers," she cried.

Gaga stood there smiling shyly, and looking at her with his appealing
eyes. In this light he looked very handsome, and Sally felt almost sorry
to see that he also looked tired. His face was quite grey, and his
movements were those of an exceedingly nervous person who would always
shrink from roughness.

"I'm so sorry you should have had to work so late," he said.

"Oo, it's nothing," cried Sally. "Do me good. If I was at home I should
only be working there," she added, explanatorily. "Work, work, work."

"Don't you ever get any fun?" asked Gaga, timidly. "I mean, go out, or
anything?"

Sally shook her head. She was silhouetted against the light.

"No," she told him. "Not often." It was strange how refined her voice
automatically became when she was talking to Gaga. She was altogether
restrained. "You can't if you've got to earn your own living. And have
to get here early in the morning."

Gaga hesitated, half turned away, came back.

"I'm very sorry," he said, in his gentle, weak way. "Don't you like it?
I mean going out. Or is it just that you don't get the chance? Poor
little girl. Er-- I'm sorry. Er--it's a beautiful night, isn't it?"

"Lovely," agreed Sally. "I'm going to walk home."

He considered that. He did not seem to have anything more to say. Sally
moved to her place, and mechanically put away her scissors and thimble.
She was still in her pinafore, and she could not take that off and roll
it up while Gage was in the room. So they stood there, separated by
several yards. He took out a cigarette case, and lighted a cigarette,
throwing the match under the long table at the side of the room.

"Yes," he said reflectively. "Are you going to have dinner first?"

"Me?" laughed Sally. She shook her head. "When I get home. If I had
dinner in London it would take all my wages, and more, at a single go."
She laughed again, but not woundingly.

Gaga looked at his shoes, again at Sally, again at his shoes.

"Look here," he blurted out, "I wish you'd...."

Sally's ears were pricked; but they heard only the opening of the door
of Madam's room as Miss Summers returned. Both Sally and Gaga turned
away, as if in slight chagrin. Then Gaga backed out of the workroom. The
conversation was over. It was time to go home. Slowly Sally removed her
pinafore and rolled it, thinking rapidly. Miss Summers was so pleased at
Madam's satisfaction with the dress that she was beaming and purring and
rubbing her hands together. She nodded benevolently at Sally.

"Well, you get off, Sally," she said, in a full tone of delight. "It's
quite all right. Madam's very pleased with the dress. Don't hang about
now, but get home to your supper. You've been a very good girl."

Sally put on her hat.

"Good night, Miss Summers." And as she passed the door of Madam's room
she gave a little silent nod towards it, and a little grimace also. She
was out upon the stairs. She was out of doors. And as she walked along
she heard rapid footsteps behind her, shrank a little, and looked up to
see Gaga standing beside her, quite breathless, as if with a hurried
journey.

"Er-- Miss Minto," he panted. "I'm sorry.... I ... will you take these?
Er--good night."

He raised his hat, and went into the building, leaving Sally mutely
clasping a box of chocolates which he had thrust into her hand. She
looked round, but he had disappeared, and she began to march homeward,
still clasping the chocolates. Only when she was in Regent Street with
her treasure did Sally dare to laugh. Then the whole scene came back to
her so vividly that she could control her mirth no longer, but stared,
shaking, into a shop window. He must have hurried out to buy the
chocolates after being interrupted by Miss Summers.

"My!" she whispered to herself. "My!" For a time that was all she could
say; but as she resumed her journey she exclaimed: "Chocolates! He never
gave Rose anything at all. Ee! He was going to ask me to dinner. Wish he
had! He didn't dare! My word, he hasn't half got a crush on me! Old
Gaga!" She was consumed with delighted laughter, that made her break
into smiles at intervals during the whole of the dismal walk which
followed.


viii

"Here, have a chocolate, ma," said Sally. Mrs. Minto was sitting beside
the empty grate reading, with the aid of a magnifying glass, a piece of
newspaper which had been wrapped around Sally's mended shoes. She looked
very frail and meagre, but she was very much better than she had been,
and but for the ugliness of the room and the drabness of her clothes she
would not have appeared miserable. She was, in fact, a pathetic figure;
but thanks to Sally they were no longer starving, or in immediate danger
of it.

"Chocolates!" cried Mrs. Minto. Then, sternly and suspiciously, she said
in her weak voice of warning, "Where did you get _them_ from, Sally?"

"Won 'em in a raffle," declared Sally.

"Oo, gambling!" reproved Mrs. Minto. "It's very wrong of young
girls----"

"Fiddlesticks! They're good chocolates, too," said Sally. "Don't make
yourself sick. It's a nuisance. Besides, I want some myself. I _am_
hungry. I've been working all the evening."

"Working!" grumbled her mother, incredulously.

"Well.... I ... _have_!" asserted Sally. "Perhaps you'd like me to get
Miss Summers to give me a certificate? You'll see. I shall have a bit
more money at the end of the week. Then you'll rub your eyes. You'll
apologise--I don't think! No, I'm a bad girl, wasting my time gadding
about. You never think of that when you get the money, or the money if
I'm late."

"Hush! Hush!" begged her mother. "I never said you was a bad girl.
You're a very good girl. But when you bring home a box of chocolates at
this hour--nine o'clock, and past--and say you won them in a raffle, and
you've been working--well!"

"What's that you're reading?" asked Sally, pointing to the small print.

Mrs. Minto straightened the sheet of newspaper, and held it up to the
light.

"It's an old paper," she said. "A trial."

"Lor! Murder?" Sally almost left her supper. "What's it all about?"

"Well ... oo, he must a been a wicked wretch. He poisoned the old lady.
He'd robbed her before he did it. Took all her money to give her an
annuity, and then he poisoned her."

"Poison! Whew! What sort of poison?"

"Flypapers, it was. Not them sticky ones, but the brown, what you put in
water. Got arsenic in them, they have."

"What's arsenic?"

Mrs. Minto looked over her magnifying glass at Sally in a bewildered
way.

"I don't know. It's poison. I never poisoned anybody. Not that I know
of."

"No," agreed Sally. She thought to herself: "She ought to have poisoned
dad. All of us." Melancholy seized her, a dreadful passing fit of
depression. Suddenly she longed for Toby. Aloud, she proceeded, more
seriously: "If it's in the flypapers, why don't we all get poisoned,
ma?"

"Well, it seems he soaked the papers, and drained off the water, with
the poison in it, and mixed it with her food--beef tea, and that. _She_
never noticed anything. She had awful pains, and diarrhoea, and was
sick; and then she died, poor thing."

"Hn," said Sally, reaching out for the chocolates. "I'll read it. I like
murders."

"Hush!" cried Mrs. Minto, in horror. "Read them--yes; but say you like
murders! What wicked people there are in the world, to be sure. I hope
they hanged him."

"Doesn't it say?" mumbled Sally, dealing with a chocolate with caramel
inside it.

"It's torn across. It's what I got your shoes in, Sally. It's a.... It's
'Stories of Famous Trials,' in the Weekly Something.... I can't see what
it is."

For the next quarter of an hour Sally ate chocolates and read about the
trial of Seddon for murdering Miss Barrow.

"Miss Barrow!" she exclaimed. "Wonder if she was any relation to old
Perce! I'll ask Mrs. Perce about it. Oo--fancy Tollington Park! Quite
near us in Hornsey Road."

Mrs. Minto shuddered, and looked furtively at the clock, longing for
her bedtime. Sally caught the glance, shut up the box of chocolates, and
folded the paper.

"You going to work?" asked her mother.

"Wash my hair."

"You're always washing ... _washing_, you call it!" cried Mrs. Minto.

Sally ignored the sneer, and proceeded to her occupation. There was a
silence. Mrs. Minto yawned. She looked at Sally making her preparations,
and into her face came a watchful anxiety that was mingled with profound
esteem. There was a _chic_ about her girl that made Mrs. Minto assume
this expression quite often, and Sally knew it. She knew it now, and was
elaborately unconscious of it. As she waited for the kettle and moved
the lamp so that it would illumine the washstand, she whistled to show
how blind she was to any sign of emotion from her mother. When the
whistle was unavailing, she said sharply:

"Don't you think this is a pretty frock, ma?"

Mrs. Minto sighed heavily, and pulled herself up out of her chair.

"Far _too_ pretty, if you ask me," she said. "Looks to me fast." She was
full of concern, and did not try to hide it from Sally.

"Oo!" cried Sally. "You _are_ stupid, ma!" And with that she whipped the
dress over her head and revealed the fact that she wore no petticoat.
Her mother was the more outraged.

Sally began to sing.

  "'When you and I go down the love path together,
  Stars shall be shining and the night so fair.'"

"Well, it's a good thing nobody else sees you like that," sniffed her
mother, rebukingly. "I don't know what they _would_ think!"

Sally forebore to make the obvious retort. Her mother prepared for bed.


ix

For the next fortnight Sally did not see Gaga, and only at the end of
the period did she learn that he had been away from London on business.
This was one of the journeys of which Miss Summers had spoken, to the
agricultural districts. Sally could not discover whether Gaga actually
acted as traveller for his own firm; but she gathered that he found it
useful to see how the country was behaving itself in the matter of
agriculture. She suspected also that he went away for his health. She
speculated as to what he looked like with his handsome coat off, and
recalled wrists that could have been spanned with ease by her own small
fingers. In contrast, when she saw Toby, she saw with swelling pride how
big his hands were, and felt his already increased muscles. Once he
swung her clear from the ground with one arm, so that her feet kicked
against his leg in helplessness. He was getting stronger and stouter
than ever, and his eyes were clear and his skin tanned and smoothed by
the breeze. She adored him. He wanted her to go away with him during one
of his leaves; 

Showing first 200,000 characters. Full text: gutenberg.org/ebooks/31005