"I'm sure he hasn't the slightest idea--not the slightest!" said Hilda half defensively. But she was saying to herself: "This man made me write a lie, and now I hear that his sister is starving--in the same town!"

And she thought of his glossy opulence. "I'm quite sure of _that_!" she repeated to Janet.

"Oh! So am I!" Janet eagerly concurred. "That's why I came.... Somebody had to give him a hint.... I never dreamt of finding you, dear!"

"It is strange, isn't it?" said Hilda, the wondrous romance of things seizing her. Seen afresh, through the eyes of this charming, sympathetic acquaintance, was not Mr. Cannon's originality in engaging her positively astounding?

"I suppose _you_ couldn't give him a hint?"

"Yes, I'll tell him," said Hilda. "Of course!" In spite of herself she was a.s.suming a certain proprietorship in Mr. Cannon.

"I'm so glad!" Janet replied. "It is good of you!"

"It seems to me it's you that's good, Janet," Hilda said grimly. She thought: "Should _I_, out of simple kindliness and charity, have deliberately come to tell a man I didn't know... that his sister was starving? Never!"

"He's bound to see after it!" said Janet, content.

"Why, of course!" said Hilda, clinching the affair, in an intimate, confidential murmur.

"You'll tell him to-night?"

Hilda nodded.

They exchanged a grave glance of mutual appreciation and understanding.

Each was sure of the other's high esteem. Each was glad that chance had brought about the meeting between them. Then they lifted away their apprehensive solicitude for Sarah Gailey, and Janet, having sighed relief, began to talk about old times. And their voices grew louder and more free.

"Can you tell me what time it is?" Janet asked, later. "I've broken the spring of my watch, and I have to meet father at the station at ten-fifteen."

"I haven't a notion!" said Hilda, rather ashamed.

"I hope it isn't ten o'clock."

"I could ask," said Hilda hesitatingly. The hour, for aught she knew, was nine, eleven, or even midnight. She was oblivious of time.

"I'll run," said Janet, preparing to go. "I shall tell Charlie I've seen you, next time I write to him. I'm sure he'll be glad. And you must come to see us. You really must, now! Mother and father will be delighted. Do you still recite, like you used to?"

Hilda shook her head, blushing.

She made no definite response to the invitation, which surprised, agitated, and flattered her. She wanted to accept it, but she was convinced that she never would accept it. Before departing, Janet lifted her veil, with a beautiful gesture, and offered her lips to kiss. They embraced affectionately. The next moment Hilda, at the top of the dim, naked, resounding stair, was watching Janet descend--a figure infinitely stylish and agreeable to the eye.

CHAPTER IX IN THE STREET

I

A few minutes later, just as Hilda had sealed up the last of the letters, Mr. Cannon issued somewhat hurriedly out of the inner room, b.u.t.toning his overcoat at the neck.

"Good night," he said, and took his stick from the corner where he had placed it.

"Mr. Cannon!"

"Well?"

"I wanted to speak to you."

"What is it? I'm in a hurry."

She glanced at the inner door, which he had left open. From beyond that door came the voices of Arthur Dayson and the old clerk; Hilda lacked the courage to cross the length of the room and deliberately close it, and though Mr. Cannon did not seem inclined to move, his eyes followed the direction of hers and he must have divined her embarra.s.sment. She knew not what to do. A crisis seemed to rise up monstrous between them, in an instant. She was trembling, and in acute trouble.

"It's rather important," she said timidly, but not without an unintentional violence.

"Well, to-morrow afternoon."

He, too, was apparently in a fractious state. The situation was perhaps perilous. But she could not allow her conduct to be influenced by danger or difficulty, which indeed nearly always had the effect of confirming her purpose. If something had to be done, it had to be done--and let that suffice! He waited, impatient, for her to agree and allow him to go.

"No," she answered, with positive resentment in her clear voice. "I must speak to you to-night. It's very important."

He made with his tongue an inarticulate noise of controlled exasperation.

"If you've finished, put your things on and walk along with me," he said.

She hurried to obey, and overtook him as he slowly descended the lower flight of stairs. She had b.u.t.toned her jacket and knotted her thick scarf, and now, with the letters pressed tightly under her arm lest they should fall, she was pulling on her gloves.

"I have an appointment at the Saracen's," he said mildly, meaning the Saracen's Head--the central rendezvous of the town, where Conservative and Liberal met on neutral ground.

II

He turned to the left, toward the High Street and the great cleared s.p.a.ce out of which the cellarage of the new Town Hall had already been scooped. He carried his thick gloves in his white and elegant hand, as one who did not feel the frost. She stepped after him. Their breaths whitened the keen air. She was extremely afraid, and considered herself an abject coward, but she was determined to the point of desperation. He ought to know the truth and he ought to know it at once: nothing else mattered. She reflected in her terror: "If I don't begin right off, he will be asking me to begin, and that will be worse than ever." She was like one who, having boastfully undertaken to plunge into deep, cold water from a height, has climbed to the height, and measured the fearful distance, and is sick, and dares not leap, but knows that he must leap.

"I suppose you know Miss Gailey is practically starving," she said abruptly, harshly, staring at the gutter.

She had leapt. Life seemed to leave her. She had not intended to use such words, nor such a tone. She certainly did not suppose that he knew about Miss Gailey's condition. She had affirmed to Janet Orgreave her absolute a.s.surance that he did not know. As for the tone, it was accusing, it was brutal, it was full of the unconscious and terrible clumsy cruelty of youth.

"What?" His head moved sharply sideways, to look at her.

"Miss Gailey--she's starving, it seems!" Hilda said timidly now, almost apologetically. "I felt sure you didn't know. I thought _some_ one should tell you."

"What do you mean--starving?" he asked gruffly.

"Not enough to eat," she replied, with the direct simplicity of a child.

"And how did this tale get about?"

"It's true," she said. "I was told to-night."

"Who told you?"