It wants to flow, but the cold will still it. Do you see, Sue? Here, among the rushes?'
She gazed, and frowned. I watched the movement of her face. And I said— as I had said about the soup: 'It's only water, miss.'
'Only water?'
59
'Brown water.'
She blinked.
'You are cold,' I said then. 'Come back, to the house. We've been out too long.' I put her arm about mine. I did it, not thinking; and her arm stayed stiff. But then, the next day— or perhaps, the day
after that— she took my arm again, and was not so stiff; and after that, I suppose we joined arms naturally ... I don't know. It was only later that I wondered about it and tried to look back. But by then I could only see that there was once a time when we had walked apart; and then a time when we walked together.
She was just a girl, after all; for all that they called her a lady. She was just a girl that had never known fun. One day I was tidying one of her drawers and found a deck of cards in it. She said she thought they must have been her mother's. She knew the suits, but that was all— she called the jacks, cavaliers!— so I taught her one or two soft Borough games— All- fours, and Put. We played for matches and spills, at first; then we found, in another drawer, a box of little counters, made of mother-of-pearl and shaped like fish and diamonds and crescent moons; and after that, we played for them.
The mother-of-pearl was very sweet and cool on the hand.— My hand, I mean; for Maud of course still wore her gloves. And when she put down a card she put it down neatly, making the edges and corners match with the ones below. After a while I began to do that, too.
While we played, we talked. She liked to hear me talk of London. 'Is it truly so large?'
she'd say. And there are theatres? And what they call, fashion- houses?'
And eating- houses. And every kind of shop. And parks, miss.'
'Parks, like my uncle's?'
A little like,' I'd say. 'But filled with people, of course.— Are you low, miss, or high?'
'I am high.' She set down a card.'— Quite filled, would you say?'
'I am higher. There. Three fish, to your two.'
'How well you play!— Quite filled, you say, with people?'
'Of course. But dark. Will you cut?'
'Dark? Are you sure? I thought London was said to be bright. With great lamps fired— I believe— with gas?'
'Great lamps, like diamonds!' I said. 'In the theatres and halls. You may dance there, miss, right through the night— '
'Dance, Sue?'
'Dance, miss.' Her face had changed. I put the cards down. 'You like to dance, of course?'
'I— ' She coloured, and lowered her gaze. 'I was never taught it. Do you think,' she said, looking up, 'I might be a lady, in London— that is,' she added quickly, 'if I were ever to go there.— Do you think I might be a lady in London, and yet not dance?'
She passed her hand across her lip, rather nervously. I said, 'You might, I suppose.
Shouldn't you like to learn, though? You could find a dancing- master.'
'Could I?' She looked doubtful, then shook her head. 'I am not sure . . .'
I guessed what she was thinking. She was thinking of Gentleman, and what he might say when he found out she couldn't dance. She was thinking of all the girls he might 60
be meeting in London, who could.
I watched her fret for a minute or two. Then, 'Look here,' I said, getting up. 'It is easy, look— '
And I showed her a couple of steps, to a couple of dances. Then I made her rise and try them with me. She stood in my arms like wood, and gazed, in a frightened sort of way, at her feet. Her slippers caught on the Turkey carpet. So then I put the carpet back; and then she moved more easily. I showed her a jig, and then a polka. I said,
'There. Now we're flying, ain't we?' She gripped my gown until I thought it should tear. 'This way,' I said. 'Now, this. I am the gentleman, remember. Of course, it will go much better, with a real gent— '
Then she stumbled again, and we flew apart and fell into separate chairs. She put her hands to her side. Her breath came in catches. Her colour was higher than ever. Her cheek was damp. Her skirt stuck out like a little Dutch girl's on a plate.
She caught my eye, and smiled; though she still looked frightened.
'I shall dance,' she said, 'in London. Shan't I, Sue?'
'You shall,' I said. And at that moment, I believed it. I made her rise and dance again.
It was only afterwards, when we had stopped and she had grown cool, and stood before the fire to warm up her cold hands— it was only then that I remembered that, of course, she never would.
For, though I knew her fate— though I knew it so well, I was helping to make it!— perhaps I knew it rather in the way you might know the fate of a person in a story or a play. Her world was so queer, so quiet and shut- up, it made the proper world— the ordinary, double-dealing world, where I had sat over a pig's head supper and a glass of flip while Mrs Sucksby and John Vroom laughed to think what I would do with my share of Gentleman's stolen fortune— it made that world seem harder than ever, but so far off, the hardness meant nothing. At first I would say to myself, 'When Gentleman comes I'll do this'; or, 'Once he gets her in the madhouse, I'll do that.' But I'd say it, then look at her; and she was so simple and so good, the thought would vanish, I would end up combing her hair or straightening the sash on her gown. It wasn't that I was sorry— or not much, not then. It was just I suppose that we were put together for so many hours at a time; and it was nicer to be kind to her and not think too hard about what lay before her, than to dwell on it and feel cruel.
Of course, it was different for her. She was looking forwards. She liked to talk; but more often she liked to be silent, and think. I would see her face change, then. I would lie at her side at night, and feel the turning, turning of her thoughts— feel her grow warm, perhaps blush in the dark; and then I knew she was thinking of Gentleman, working out how soon he'd come, wondering if he was thinking of her.— I could have told her, he was. But she never spoke of him, she never said his name. She only asked, once or twice, after my old aunty, that was supposed to be his nurse; and I wished she wouldn't, for when I spoke of her I thought of Mrs Sucksby; and that made me home-sick.
And then there came the morning when we learned he was coming back. It was an o r d i n a r y m o r n i n g , e x c e p t t h a t M a u d h a d w o k e n a n d r u b b e d h e r f a c e , a n d winced.— Perhaps that was what they call, a premonition. I only thought that later, 61
though. At the time, I saw her chafing her cheek and said, 'What's the matter?'
She moved her tongue. 'I have a tooth, I think,' she said, 'with a point that cuts me.'
'Let me see,' I said.
I took her to the window and she stood with her face in my hands and let me feel about her gum. I found the pointed tooth almost at once.
'Well, that is sharper— 1 began.
'Than a serpent's tooth, Sue?' she said.
'Than a needle, I was going to say, miss,' I answered. I went to her sewing-box and brought out a thimble. A silver thimble, to match the flying scissors.
Maud stroked her jaw. 'Do you know anyone who was bitten by a snake, Sue?' she asked me.
What could you say? Her mind ran to things like that. Perhaps it was the country living. I said I didn't. She looked at me, then opened her mouth again and I put the thimble on my finger and rubbed at the pointed tooth until the point was taken off. I had seen Mrs Sucksby do it many times, with infants.— Of course, infants rather wriggle about. Maud stood very still, her pink lips parted, her face put back, her eyes at first closed then open and gazing at me, her cheek with a flush upon it. Her throat lifted and sank, as she swallowed. My hand grew wet, from the damp of her breaths. I rubbed, then felt with my thumb. She swallowed again. Her eyelids fluttered, and she caught my eye.