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She keeps her eyes on mine, but speaks to Richard. Her voice is thick with the tears of age, or of emotion.

'Good boy,' she says.

C h a p t e r T w e lve

Then there comes a kind of chaos.

The dog barks and leaps, the baby in its blanket gives a cry; another baby, that I have not noticed— it lies in a tin box, beneath the table— begins to cry also. Richard takes off his hat and his coat, sets down our bags, and stretches. The scowling boy drops open his mouth and shows the meat within.

'It ain't Sue,' he says.

'Miss Lilly,' says the woman before me, quietly. 'Ain't you just the darling. Are you very tired, dear? You have come quite a journey'

'It ain't Sue,' says the boy again, a little louder.

'Change of plan,' says Richard, not catching my eye. 'Sue stays °n behind, to take care of a few last points.— Mr Ibbs, how are you, sir?'

'Sweet, son,' the pale man answers. He has taken off his apron and is quieting the dog.

The boy who opened the door to us has

gone. The little brazier is cooling and ticking and growing grey. The red-haired girl 200

bends over the screaming babies with a bottle and a spoon, but is still stealing looks at me.

The scowling boy says, 'Change of plan? I don't get it.' 'You will,' answers Richard.

'Unless— ' He puts his finger against his mouth, and winks.

The woman, meanwhile, is still before me, still describing my face with her hands, telling off my features as if they were beads upon a string. 'Brown eyes,' she says, beneath her breath; her breath is sweet as sugar. 'Pink lips, two pouters. Nice and dainty at the chin. Teeth, white as china. Cheeks— rather soft, I dare say? Oh!'

I have stood, as if in a trance, and let her murmur; now, feeling her fingers flutter against my face, I start away from her.

'How dare you?' I say. 'How dare you speak to me? How dare you look at me, any of you? And you— ' I go to Richard and seize his waistcoat. 'What is this? Where have you brought me to? What do they know of Sue, here?'

'Hey, hey,' calls the pale man mildly. The boy laughs. The woman looks rueful.

'Got a voice, don't she?' says the girl.

'Like the blade on a knife,' says the man. 'That clean.'

R ichard meets my gaze, then looks away. 'What can I say?' He shrugs. 'I am a villain.'

'Damn your attitudes now!' I say. 'Tell me what this means. Whose house is this? Is it yours?'

'Is it his!' The boy laughs harder, and chokes on his meat.

'John, be quiet, or I'll thrash you,' says the woman. 'Don't mind him, Miss Lilly, I implore you now, don't!'

I can feel her wringing her hands, but do not look at her. I keep my eyes upon Richard.

'Tell me,' I say.

'Not mine,' he answers at last.

'Not ours?' He shakes his head. 'Whose, then? Where, then?'

He rubs at his eye. He is tired. 'It is theirs,' he says, nodding to the woman, the man.

'Their house, in the Borough.'

The Borough ... I have heard him say the name, once or twice before. I stand for a moment in silence, thinking back across his

words; then my heart drops. 'Sue's house,' I say. 'Sue's house, of thieves.'

'Honest thieves,' says the woman, creeping closer, 'to those that know us!'

I think: Sue's aunt! I was sorry for her, once. Now I turn and almost spit at her. 'Will you keep from me, you witch?' The kitchen grows silent. It seems darker, too, and close. I still have Richard gripped by the waistcoat. When he tries to pull away, I hold him tighter. My thoughts are leaping, fast as hares. I think, He has married me, and has brought me here, as a place to be rid of me. He means to keep my money for himself. He means to give them some trifling share for the killing of me, and Sue— even in the midst of my shock and confusion, my heart drops again, as I think it— Sue they will free. Sue knows it all.

'You shan't do it!' I say, my voice rising. 'You think I don't know what you mean to do?

All of you? What trick?'

'You don't know anything, Maud,' he answers. He tries to draw my hands from his coat. I will not let him. I think, if he does that, they will certainly kill me. For a second 201

we struggle. Then: 'The stitching, Maud!' he says. He plucks my fingers free. I catch at his arm instead.

'Take me back,' I say. I say it, thinking: Don't let them see you are afraid! But my voice has risen higher and I cannot make it firm. 'Take me back, at once, to the streets and hackneys.'

He shakes his head, looks away. 'I can't do it.'

'Take me now. Or I go, alone. I shall make my way— I saw the route! I studied it, hard!— and I shall find out a— a policeman!'

The boy, the pale man, the woman and girl, all flinch or wince. The dog barks.

'Now now,' says the man, stroking his moustache. 'You must be careful how you talk, dear, in a house like this.'

'It is you who must be careful!' I say. I look from one face to another. 'What is it you think you shall have from this? Money? Oh, no. It is you who must be careful. It is all of you! And you, Richard— you— who must be most careful of all, should I once find a policeman and begin to talk.'

But Richard looks and says nothing. 'Do you hear me?' I cry.

The man winces again, and puts his finger to his ear as if to clear it of wax. 'Like a blade,' he says, to no-one, to everyone. 'Ain't it?'

'Damn you!' I say. I look wildly about me for a moment, then make a sudden grab at my bag. Richard reaches it first, however, he hooks it with his long leg and kicks it across the floor, almost playfully. The boy takes it up, and holds it in his lap. He produces a knife and begins to pick at the lock. The blade flashes.

Richard folds his arms. 'You see you cannot leave, Maud,' he says simply. 'You cannot go, with nothing.'

He has moved to the door, to stand before it. There are other doors, that lead, perhaps to a street, perhaps only into other dark rooms. I shall never choose the right one. 'I am sorry,' he says.

The boy's knife flashes again. Now, I think, they will kill me. The thought itself is like a blade, and astonishingly sharp. For haven't I willed my life away, at Briar? Haven't I felt it rising from me, and been glad? Now I suppose they mean to kill me; and I am more afraid than I have imagined it possible to be, of anything, anything at all.

You fool, I say to myself. But to them I say: 'You shan't. You shan't!' I run one way, and then another; finally I dart, not for the door at Richard's back, but for the slumbering, swollen- headed baby. I seize it, and shake it, and put my hand to its neck.

'You shan't!' I say again. 'Damn you, do you think I have come so far, for this?' I look at the woman. 'I shall kill your baby first!'— I think I would do it.— 'See, here! I shall stifle it!'

The man, the girl, the boy, look interested. The woman looks sorry. 'My dear,' she says,

'I have seven babies about the place, just now. Make it six, if you want. Make it'— with a gesture to the tin box beneath the table— 'make it five. It is all the same to me. I fancy I am about to give the business up, anyway.'

The creature in my arms slumbers on, but gives a kick. I feel the rapid palpitation of its heart beneath my fingers, and there is a

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fluttering at the top of its swollen head. The woman still watches. The girl Puts ^er hand to her neck, and rubs. Richard searches in his pocket for a cigarette. He says, as he does it, 'Put the damn child down, Maud, won't you?'