At the time appointed for their next meeting, Hilliard waited in vain.
An hour passed, and Eve, who had the uncommon virtue of punctuality,
still did not come. The weather was miserable--rain, fog, and
slush--but this had heretofore proved no obstacle, for her lodgings
were situated less than half a mile away. Afraid of missing her if he
went out, he fretted through another hour, and was at length relieved
by the arrival of a letter of explanation. Eve wrote that she had been
summoned to Dudley; her father was stricken with alarming illness, and
her brother had telegraphed.
For two days he heard nothing; then came a few lines which told him
that Mr. Madeley could not live many more hours. On the morrow Eve
wrote that her father was dead.
To the letter which he thereupon despatched Hilliard had no reply for
nearly a week. When Eve wrote, it was from a new address at Dudley.
After thanking him for the kind words with which he had sought to
comfort her, she continued--
"I have at last found something to do, and it was quite time, for I
have been very miserable, and work is the best thing for me. Mr.
Welland, my first employer, when I was twelve years old, has asked me
to come and keep his books for him, and I am to live in his house. My
brother has gone into lodgings, and we see no more of the cottage on
Kate's Hill. It's a pity I have to be so far from you again, but there
seems to be no hope of getting anything to do in Birmingham, and here I
shall be comfortable enough, as far as mere living goes. On Sunday I
shall be quite free, and will come over as often as possible; but I
have caught a bad cold, and must be content to keep in the house until
this dreadful weather changes. Be more careful of yourself than you
generally are, and let me hear often. In a few months' time we shall be
able to spend pleasant hours on the Castle Hill. I have heard from
Patty, and want to tell you about her letter, but this cold makes me
feel too stupid Will write again soon."
It happened that Hilliard himself was just now blind and voiceless with
a catarrh. The news from Dudley by no means solaced him. He crouched
over his fire through the long, black day, tormented with many
miseries, and at eventide drank half a bottle of whisky, piping hot,
which at least assured him of a night's sleep.
Just to see what would be the result of his silence, he wrote no reply
to this letter. A fortnight elapsed; he strengthened himself in
stubbornness, aided by the catarrh, which many bottles of whisky would
not overcome. When his solitary confinement grew at length
insufferable, he sent for Narramore, and had not long to wait before
his friend appeared. Narramore was rosy as ever: satisfaction with life
beamed from his countenance.
"I've ordered you in some wine," he exclaimed genially, sinking into
the easy-chair which Hilliard had vacated for him--an instance of
selfishness in small things which did not affect his generosity in
greater. "It isn't easy to get good port nowadays, but they tell me
that this is not injurious. Hasn't young Birching been to see you? No,
I suppose he would think it _infra dig_. to come to this neighbourhood.
There's a damnable self-conceit in that family: you must have noticed
it, eh? It comes out very strongly in the girl. By-the-bye I've done
with her--haven't been there for three weeks, and don't think I shall
go again, unless it's for the pleasure of saying or doing something
that'll irritate her royal highness."
"Did you quarrel?"
"Quarrel? I never quarrel with anyone; it's bad for one's nerves."
"Did you get as far as proposing?"
"Oh, I left _her_ to do that. Women are making such a row about their
rights nowadays, that it's as well to show you grant them perfect
equality. I gave her every chance of saying something definite. I
maintain that she trifled with my affections. She asked me what my
views in life were. Ah, thought I, now it's coming; and I answered
modestly that everything depended on circumstances. I might have said
it depended on the demand for brass bedsteads; but perhaps that would
have verged on indelicacy--you know that I am delicacy personified. 'I
thought,' said Miss Birching, 'that a man of any energy made his own
circumstances?' 'Energy!' I shouted. 'Do you look for energy in _me_?
It's the greatest compliment anyone ever paid me.' At that she seemed
desperately annoyed, and wouldn't pursue the subject. That's how it
always was, just when the conversation grew interesting."
"I'm sorry to see you so cut up about it," remarked Hilliard.
"None of your irony, old fellow. Well, the truth is, I've seen someone
I like better."
"Not surprised."
"It's a queer story; I'll tell it you some day, if it comes to
anything. I'm not at all sure that it will, as there seems to be a sort
of lurking danger that I may make a damned fool of myself."
"Improbable?" commented the listener. "Your blood is too temperate."
"So I thought; but one never knows. Unexpected feelings crop up in a
fellow. We won't talk about it just now. How have things been going in
the architectural line?"
"Not amiss. Steadily, I think."
Narramore lay back at full length, his face turned to the ceiling.
"Since I've been living out yonder, I've got a taste for the country. I
have a notion that, if brass bedsteads keep firm, I shall some day
build a little house of my own; an inexpensive little house, with a
tree or two about it. Just make me a few sketches, will you? When
you've nothing better to do, you know."
He played with the idea, till it took strong hold of him, and he began
to talk with most unwonted animation.
"Five or six thousand pounds--I ought to be able to sink that in a few
years. Not enough, eh? But I don't want a mansion. I'm quite serious
about this, Hilliard. When you re feeling ready to start on your own
account, you shall have the job."
Hilliard laughed grimly at the supposition that he would ever attain
professional independence, but his friend talked on, and overleaped
difficulties with a buoyancy of spirit which ultimately had its effect
upon the listener. When he was alone again, Hilliard felt better, both
in body and mind, and that evening, over the first bottle of
Narramore's port, he amused himself with sketching ideal cottages.
"The fellow's in love, at last. When a man thinks of pleasant little
country houses, 'with a tree or two' about them----"
He sighed, and ground his teeth, and sketched on.
Before bedtime, a sudden and profound shame possessed him. Was he not
behaving outrageously in neglecting to answer Eve's letter? For all he
knew the cold of which she complained might have caused her more
suffering than he himself had gone through from the like cause, and
that was bad enough. He seized paper and wrote to her as he had never
written before, borne on the very high flood of passionate longing.
Without regard to prudence he left the house at midnight and posted his
letter.
"It never occurred to me to blame you for not writing," Eve quickly
replied; "I'm afraid you are more sensitive than I am, and, to tell the
truth, I believe men generally _are_ more sensitive than women in
things of this kind. It pleased me very much to hear of the visit you
had had from Mr. Narramore, and that he had cheered you. I do so wish I
could have come, but I have really been quite ill, and I must not think
of risking a journey till the weather improves. Don't trouble about it;
I will write often."
"I told you about a letter I had had from poor Patty, and I want to ask
you to do something. Will you write to her? Just a nice, friendly
little letter. She would be so delighted, she would indeed. There's no
harm in copying a line or two from what she sent me. 'Has Mr. Hilliard
forgotten all about me?' she says. 'I would write to him, but I feel
afraid. Not afraid of _you_, dear Eve, but he might feel I was
impertinent. What do you think? We had such delicious times together,
he and you and I, and I really don't want him to forget me altogether?'
Now I have told her that there is no fear whatever of your forgetting
her, and that we often speak of her. I begin to think that I have been
unjust to Patty in calling her silly, and making fun of her. She was
anything but foolish in breaking off with that absurd Mr. Dally, and I
can see now that she will never give a thought to him again. What I
fear is that the poor girl will never find any one good enough for her.
The men she meets are very vulgar, and vulgar Patty is _not_--as you
once said to me, you remember. So, if you can spare a minute, write her
a few lines, to show that you still think of her. Her address is----,
etc."
To Hilliard all this seemed merely a pleasant proof of Eve's
amiability, of her freedom from that acrid monopolism which
characterises the ignoble female in her love relations. Straightway he
did as he was requested, and penned to Miss Ringrose a chatty epistle,
with which she could not but be satisfied. A day or two brought him an
answer. Patty's handwriting lacked distinction, and in the matter of
orthography she was not beyond reproach, but her letter chirped with a
prettily expressed gratitude. "I am living with my aunt, and am likely
to for a long time. And I get on very well at my new shop, which I have
no wish to leave." This was her only allusion to the shattered
matrimonial project: "I wish there was any chance of you and Eve coming
to live in London, but I suppose that's too good to hope for. We don't
get many things as we wish them in this world. And yet I oughtn't to
say that either, for if it hadn't been for you I should never have seen
Paris, which was so awfully jolly! But you'll be coming for a holiday,
won't you? I should so like just to see you, if ever you do. It isn't
like it was at the old shop. There's a great deal of business done
here, and very little time to talk to anyone in the shop. But many
girls have worse things to put up with than I have, and I won't make
you think I'm a grumbler."
The whole of January went by before Hilliard and Eve again saw each
other. The lover wrote at length that he could bear it no longer, that
he was coming to Dudley, if only for the mere sight of Eve's face; she
must meet him in the waiting-room at the railway station. She answered
by return of post, "I will come over next Sunday, and be with you at
twelve o'clock, but I must leave very early, as I am afraid to be out
after nightfall." And this engagement was kept.
The dress of mourning became her well; it heightened her always
noticeable air of refinement, and would have constrained to a
reverential tenderness even had not Hilliard naturally checked himself
from any bolder demonstration of joy. She spoke in a low, soft voice,
seldom raised her eyes, and manifested a new gentleness very touching
to Hilliard, though at the same time, and he knew not how or why, it
did not answer to his desire. A midday meal was in readiness for her;
she pretended to eat, but in reality scarce touched the food.
"You must taste old Narramore's port wine," said her entertainer. "The
fellow actually sent a couple of dozen."
She was not to be persuaded; her refusal puzzled and annoyed Hilliard,
and there followed a long silence. Indeed, it surprised him to find how
little they could say to each other to-day. An unknown restraint had
come between them.
"Well," he exclaimed at length, "I wrote to Patty, and she answered."
"May I see the letter?"
"Of course. Here it is."
Eve read it, and smiled with pleasure.
"Doesn't she write nicely! Poor girl!"
"Why have you taken so to commiserating her all at once?" Hilliard
asked. "She's no worse off than she ever was. Rather better, I think."
"Life isn't the same for her since she was in Paris," said Eve, with
peculiar softness.
"Well, perhaps it improved her."
"Oh, it certainly did! But it gave her a feeling of discontent for the
old life and the people about her."
"A good many of us have to suffer that. She's nothing like as badly off
as you are, my dear girl."
Eve coloured, and kept silence.
"We shall hear of her getting married before long," resumed the other.
"She told me herself that marriage was the scourge of music-shops--it
carries off their young women at such a rate."
"She told you that? It was in one of your long talks together in
London? Patty and you got on capitally together. It was very natural
she shouldn't care much for men like Mr. Dally afterwards."
Hilliard puzzled over this remark, and was on the point of making some
impatient reply, but discretion restrained him. He turned to Eve's own
affairs, questioned her closely about her life in the tradesman's
house, and so their conversation followed a smoother course. Presently,
half in jest, Hilliard mentioned Narramore's building projects.
"But who knows? It _might_ come to something of importance for me. In
two or three years, if all goes well, such a thing might possibly give
me a start."
A singular solemnity had settled upon Eve's countenance. She spoke not
a word, and seemed unaccountably ill at ease.
"Do you think I am in the clouds?" said Hilliard.
"Oh, no! Why shouldn't you get on--as other men do?"
But she would not dwell upon the hope, and Hilliard, not a little
vexed, again became silent.
Her next visit was after a lapse of three weeks. She had again been
suffering from a slight illness, and her pallor alarmed Hilliard. Again
she began with talk of Patty Ringrose.
"Do you know, there's really a chance that we may see her before long!
She'll have a holiday at Easter, from the Thursday night to Monday
night, and I have all but got her to promise that she'll come over
here. Wouldn't it be fun to let her see the Black Country? You remember
her talk about it. I could get her a room, and if it's at all bearable
weather, we would all have a day somewhere. Wouldn't you like that?"
"Yes; but I should greatly prefer a day with you alone."
"Oh, of course, the time is coming for that, Would you let us come here
one day?"
With a persistence not to be mistaken Eve avoided all intimate topics;
at the same time her manner grew more cordial. Through February and
March, she decidedly improved in health. Hilliard saw her seldom, but
she wrote frequent letters, and their note was as that of her
conversation, lively, all but sportive. Once again she had become a
mystery to her lover; he pondered over her very much as in the days
when they were newly acquainted. Of one thing he felt but too well
assured. She did not love him as he desired to be loved. Constant she
might be, but it was the constancy of a woman unaffected with ardent
emotion. If she granted him her lips they had no fervour respondent to
his own; she made a sport of it, forgot it as soon as possible. Upon
Hilliard's vehement nature this acted provocatively; at times he was
all but frenzied with the violence of his sensual impulses. Yet Eve's
control of him grew more assured the less she granted of herself; a
look, a motion of her lips, and he drew apart, quivering but subdued.
At one such moment he exclaimed:
"You had better not come here at all. I love you too insanely."
Eve looked at him, and silently began to shed tears. He implored her
pardon, prostrated himself, behaved in a manner that justified his
warning. But Eve stifled the serious drama of the situation, and forced
him to laugh with her.
In these days architectural study made little way.
Patty Ringrose was coming for the Easter holidays. She would arrive on
Good Friday. "As the weather is so very bad still," wrote Eve to
Hilliard, "will you let us come to see you on Saturday? Sunday may be
better for an excursion of some sort."
And thus it was arranged. Hilliard made ready his room to receive the
fair visitors, who would come at about eleven in the morning. As usual
nowadays, he felt discontented, but, after all, Patty's influence might
be a help to him, as it had been in worse straits.