'Has she come?'

And there were hasty steps along the pa.s.sage. Louisa entered. She flung herself upon Helena and kissed her.

'How long have you been in?' she asked, in a voice trembling with affection.

'Ten minutes,' replied Helena.

'Why didn't you send me the time of the train, so that I could come and meet you?' Louisa reproached her.

'Why?' drawled Helena.

Louisa looked at her friend without speaking. She was deeply hurt by this sarcasm.

As soon as possible Helena went upstairs. Louisa stayed with her that night. On the next day they were going to Cornwall together for their usual midsummer holiday. They were to be accompanied by a third girl--a minor friend of Louisa, a slight acquaintance of Helena.

During the night neither of the two friends slept much. Helena made confidences to Louisa, who brooded on these, on the romance and tragedy which enveloped the girl she loved so dearly. Meanwhile, Helena's thoughts went round and round, tethered amid the five days by the sea, pulling forwards as far as the morrow's meeting with Siegmund, but reaching no further.

Friday was an intolerable day of silence, broken by little tender advances and playful, affectionate sallies on the part of the mother, all of which were rapidly repulsed. The father said nothing, and avoided his daughter with his eyes. In his humble reserve there was a dignity which made his disapproval far more difficult to bear than the repeated flagrant questionings of the mother's eyes. But the day wore on. Helena pretended to read, and sat thinking. She played her violin a little, mechanically. She went out into the town, and wandered about.

At last the night fell.

'Well,' said Helena to her mother, 'I suppose I'd better pack.'

'Haven't you done it?' cried Mrs Verden, exaggerating her surprise.

'You'll never have it done. I'd better help you. What times does the train go?'

Helena smiled.

'Ten minutes to ten.'

Her mother glanced at the clock. It was only half-past eight. There was ample time for everything.

'Nevertheless, you'd better look sharp,' Mrs Verden said.

Helena turned away, weary of this exaggeration.

'I'll come with you to the station,' suggested Mrs Verden. 'I'll see the last of you. We shan't see much of you just now.'

Helena turned round in surprise.

'Oh, I wouldn't bother,' she said, fearing to make her disapproval too evident.

'Yes--I will--I'll see you off.'

Mrs Verden's animation and indulgence were remarkable. Usually she was curt and undemonstrative. On occasions like these, however, when she was reminded of the ideal relations between mother and daughter, she played the part of the affectionate parent, much to the general distress.

Helena lit a candle and went to her bedroom. She quickly packed her dress-basket. As she stood before the mirror to put on her hat, her eyes, gazing heavily, met her heavy eyes in the mirror. She glanced away swiftly as if she had been burned.

'How stupid I look!' she said to herself. 'And Siegmund, how is he, I wonder?'

She wondered how Siegmund had pa.s.sed the day, what had happened to him, how he felt, how he looked. She thought of him protectively.

Having strapped her basket, she carried it downstairs. Her mother was ready, with a white lace scarf round her neck. After a short time Louisa came in. She dropped her basket in the pa.s.sage, and then sank into a chair.

'I don't want to go, Nell,' she said, after a few moments of silence.

'Why, how is that?' asked Helena, not surprised, but condescending, as to a child.

'Oh, I don't know; I'm tired,' said the other petulantly.

'Of course you are. What do you expect, after a day like this?' said Helena.

'And rushing about packing,' exclaimed Mrs Verden, still in an exaggerated manner, this time scolding playfully.

'Oh, I don't know. I don't think I want to go, dear,' repeated Louisa dejectedly.

'Well, it is time we set out,' replied Helena, rising. 'Will you carry the basket or the violin, Mater?'

Louisa rose, and with a forlorn expression took up her light luggage.

The west opposite the door was smouldering with sunset. Darkness is only smoke that hangs suffocatingly over the low red heat of the sunken day.

Such was Helena's longed-for night. The tramcar was crowded. In one corner Olive, the third friend, rose excitedly to greet them. Helena sat mute, while the car swung through the yellow, stale lights of a third-rate street of shops. She heard Olive remarking on her sunburned face and arms; she became aware of the renewed inflammation in her blistered arms; she heard her own curious voice answering. Everything was in a maze. To the beat of the car, while the yellow blur of the shops pa.s.sed over her eyes, she repeated: 'Two hundred and forty miles--two hundred and forty miles.'

_Chapter 25_

Siegmund pa.s.sed the afternoon in a sort of stupor. At tea-time Beatrice, who had until then kept herself in restraint, gave way to an outburst of angry hysteria.

'When does your engagement at the Comedy Theatre commence?' she had asked him coldly.

He knew she was wondering about money.

'Tomorrow--if ever,' he had answered.

She was aware that he hated the work. For some reason or other her anger flashed out like sudden lightning at his 'if ever'.

'What do you think you _can_ do?' she cried. 'For I think you have done enough. We can't do as we like altogether--indeed, indeed we cannot. You have had your fling, haven't you? You have had your fling, and you want to keep on. But there's more than one person in the world. Remember that. But there are your children, let me remind you. Whose are they?

You talk about shirking the engagement, but who is going to be responsible for your children, do you think?'

'I said nothing about shirking the engagement,' replied Siegmund, very coldly.

'No, there was no need to say. I know what it means. You sit there sulking all day. What do you think _I_ do? I have to see to the children, I have to work and slave, I go on from day to day. I tell you _I'll_ stop, I tell you _I'll_ do as I like. _I'll_ go as well. No, I wouldn't be such a coward, you know that. You know _I_ wouldn't leave little children--to the workhouse or anything. They're my children; they mightn't be yours.'

'There is no need for this,' said Siegmund contemptuously.

The pressure in his temples was excruciating, and he felt loathsomely sick.