If he could have seen where she was! Meek, patient, quiet, her feet
crossed, her hands in her lap, she was sitting in his aunt’s
drawing-room, waiting for Mrs. Allanby’s return. Her face was
inexpressive; it was a face incapable of expression, like her voice and
her gestures. She was inarticulate, forever cut off from her fellows by
this queer helplessness. Nothing that went on in her brain or her heart
could ever be known by other people; she couldn’t show it, and she
couldn’t tell it. She sat there now without the least shadow on her face
of the dread and misery she was enduring.
She had hurried out ahead of Nick because she wanted to cry; because
she was obliged to cry, and she was afraid that this inexplicable
weeping would annoy him. She had run down the front steps and into the
shelter of the basement door and had stood there sobbing frantically and
silently for some time.... Oh, if she could only draw a great, free
breath, and go where she wanted and do as she pleased, and have no
duties and obligations toward anyone! If only, for one week even, she
could behave as she liked, without implicating any other person in her
behaviour! No: she was eternally bound to please people and to help
people. She was mortally weary of it. The tyranny of the Humberts, the
tyranny of Enid, the tyranny of Lawrence, were all about to be succeeded
and swallowed up in a tyranny a thousand times more exacting and
difficult. To satisfy Nick she would have to make herself over, and at
thirty that is not at all easy or pleasant, even for a loving woman. For
Nick she would have to keep young and cheerful, when she felt
immeasurably old and discouraged. She would have to make a place for
herself in his world, and to maintain it.
She dried her eyes and straightened her hat. She waited for a few
moments in her dark little niche, looking out at the rain, and
reflecting. She gave her attention to Miss Gosorkus, to Nick, to the
aunt, to the cousin. And a very great resentment grew up in her, a
stern and almost ferocious determination. _She_ was going to get some
profit from this situation; why not? Why should she always give, and
sacrifice, and efface herself? She made up her mind to begin her new
life under the most favourable possible circumstances, to eliminate all
possible disadvantages. She was filled with anger against all these
people, and a strong proletarian desire to retaliate, to repay their
indifference, their ignorance of her life and of her heart, with
arrogance, with bitterness. It was not a new feeling; she had had it
often before, for Miss Amy, for Lawrence, for other people less
important to her. It was the immeasurable resentment of a gentle and
fine spirit against the inferior people who oppress it.
* * * * *
* * * * *
She heard the sound of a motor drawing up outside, then the bell rang,
and she saw the parlour maid hurry through the hall to open the door.
“There’s a lady waiting to see you, ma’am,” she heard her say, and
Caroline said:
“Ma gracious! At _this_ time of night!”
Then, from where she sat, she could see the slim feet and ankles of
Caroline ascending the stairs, and in a moment Mrs. Allanby entered.
She actually turned pale, perhaps for the first time in her life.
“Oh!” she cried. “Oh ... you ... Mrs. Iverson.... Please sit down!”
Rosaleen was glad to do so, because her knees were weak. And for some
time they sat opposite each other, their eyes averted, saying not a
word. Mrs. Allanby grey haired and elegant, in her black crêpe de chine,
Rosaleen dejected, pensive, worn.
“I wanted to speak to you before I saw Nick,” she said, suddenly. “I
wanted to see....”
“Yes?” said Mrs. Allanby, encouragingly. A wild hope had sprung up in
her that perhaps Rosaleen didn’t _wish_ to marry Nick, that perhaps she
had fallen in love with some undesirable person like herself.
“I suppose you’d like to make the best of a bad bargain?” said Rosaleen.
These words struck Mrs. Allanby forcibly; they destroyed her hope
completely. She murmured:
“If it’s a bad bargain, why make it?”
Rosaleen ignored this.
“He’ll ask me to marry him,” she said, “and I’ll say ‘yes’.... But there
are--a lot of difficulties....”
“Yes,” said Mrs. Allanby, quickly. “You are frank with me, Mrs. Iverson,
and Ah shall be frank with you. There _are_ a great many difficulties.
It’s not ... no; it’s not a suitable match for either of you. Ah don’t
think--in fact, Ah’m _sure_ you’d neither of you be happy. If you will
weigh the disadvantages....”
“Nobody could possibly know the disadvantages better than I do!” said
Rosaleen. “But ... we’ve ... liked each other for a long time, and
nothing can stop us now. We’re surely going to be married.... And it
needn’t be so bad, if you’ll help me. That’s what I came for--to ask you
to help me. Will you, Mrs. Allanby?”
Mrs. Allanby was astounded.
“But ... Ah don’t see how you can expect me to help you!” she said,
“when--Ah would prefer--for it not to take place.”
“But it _will_ take place! That’s just the point! You’re fond of Nick.
You want things to go well for him. That’s what I meant by making the
best of a bad bargain.”
“Ma dear,” said Mrs. Allanby. “Ah wish you would listen to me. Ah’m so
much older than you. Ah know--the world. Marriages like this _can’t_ be
happy. It’s been tried over and over again; people like you and
Nick----”
“There never were two people _just_ like us. Everybody’s different,”
said Rosaleen, struggling with her thought. “Anyway, really and truly,
Mrs. Allanby, it’s no use pointing out all that. You couldn’t say
anything I don’t know. And, after all, _I’m_ the one it’ll be hardest
for. _I’m_ the one who’ll have to struggle, and learn, and change
myself. _I’m_ the one with all the handicaps.”
She paused for a moment. She thought of her barren and desolate life, of
the terrible future stretching before her. And this woman was asking her
to give up her unique solace and hope, was ready to argue with this
perishing creature as to whether it should seize the rope flung out as
it drowned.
“Why!” she cried, appalled, outraged. “Can’t you think of _me_ for an
instant? What could I do? How could I go on--without him?... Why should
I give him up? How can you possibly ask me to?”
“For his sake,” said Mrs. Allanby. “If you love him, you must be willing
to sacrifice yourself.”
“I’ve been sacrificing myself until there’s hardly anything _left_ of
me!” she cried passionately. “And it’s never done anyone any good.
People just ask me as a matter of course.... But _not_ this time.... Why
should I? He’s known me for years and years. He hasn’t cared for anyone
else. Well, have I done him any harm? Have I had a bad influence?”
“No, ma dear, of cou’se not. Ah’m not saying anything whatever against
_you_.”
“Except that I’m not good enough.... Now then, _please_, Mrs. Allanby,
won’t you look at it this way for a minute? I could just as well marry
Nick to-morrow----”
She stopped for an instant.
“And I _will_,” she went on, with downcast eyes, “if I can’t get you to
help me.... But I want to make the best of it. I want us to--to have our
chance....”
Mrs. Allanby was beaten. She saw that she couldn’t stop this thing. She
had either to make a futile struggle which would certainly antagonise
Nick, or she must, as Rosaleen said, make the best of a bad bargain.
“What did you think Ah would do?” she asked with a smothered sigh.
A flush came into Rosaleen’s pallid face. She had won! And at once she
grew gentler.
“First of all, if you’d lend me enough money to send my sister and her
family to Philadelphia, and get them settled there,” she said. “I don’t
mean that I’m--trying to get rid of them, or anything like that. I want
to help them always, and I’m sure Nick will, too. But it’s far better
for them not to be here--for him not to see them again.”
“And what else?”
“And then ... if you’ll teach me things--show me how to dress, and to
act and all that...? Before I marry Nick?”
Mrs. Allanby was silent for a while, struggling with her profound
disappointment. At last, with a long, inward sigh:
“He might have done worse!” she said to herself, and held out her hand
to Rosaleen with a charming smile.