The following day, St. John entered the studio with a face the gravity
of which boded no good for their plans, Jill feared. She knew at once
that his father had refused to countenance the match, and although she
had not dared to hope for his sanction, the knowledge that he had
positively denied it came upon her with a sense of shock. Not for one
moment did she think of resenting his objection, nor of questioning his
right to forbid the marriage, she just crept within the shelter of St.
John's arms and stayed there, her face, with its flush of mortification,
hidden against his breast.
"The governor's a silly old fool," St. John exclaimed savagely, thinking
less, perhaps, of the girl's discomfort than his own personal
grievances. "He's cut me off with nothing--at least five hundred
pounds; he gave me a cheque for that amount before giving me the kick
out."
"We won't take it," Jill cried wrathfully with the improvident contempt
of the penniless, "We won't touch a farthing of it, will we?"
"Oh; yes, we will," he answered. "We'll get married on it in the first
place, and then live on the rest for so long as it will last."
"I wouldn't get married on that five hundred pounds for anything," Jill
said firmly.
"Well, I'm going to," he replied, "I'm going to see about it now. We'll
go before a Registrar--much nicer than Church, you know, doesn't take so
long. And then I'm going to invest the rest with a little capital that
I have by me in a snug little business--haberdashery, or something of
the kind; I'm not quite sure what, though I thought about nothing else
all last night."
Jill gave a quiet laugh.
"My dear old boy," she said, "you must allow me a say in that matter if
you please. I wouldn't let you have a haberdashery; I'd sooner that you
were a pork butcher at once."
"No good," he answered. "I've thought of that too; but I couldn't kill
a pig for love or money. I could measure out a yard or two of ribbon
though, and sell worsted stockings to old women. I say, Jill, what do
you think of a photographic studio?--That's the next best thing to art."
Jill had a fine contempt for photography, and said so, but St. John was
rather taken with the new idea, and as he pointed out while he did the
mechanical work she could paint portraits and enlargements, and have a
kind of Art Gallery as well. He spoke with a cheery confidence that
showed that he fully expected her to fall in with his plan immediately
and be struck as he was with the brilliance of the idea. But for once
Jill's spirit seemed to have deserted her, and she turned away with a
catch in her voice, and quite a forlorn expression in the grey eyes
which a moment ago had been smiling into his.
"Oh, Jack, don't!" she cried. "I can't bear to listen to you. My poor
old saint, I wish that you had never met me."
"Stop that," commanded St. John sharply. "You make me feel such a
beastly cad--the son of a beastlier cad--"
She turned and laid her hand upon his lips, shaking her head at him
reprovingly.
"Your language isn't fit for a stable," she said in her elder sister,
teacher-to-pupil tone. "I can't have you calling people names here.
Besides what I said need not have excited your risability like that. I
meant it in all sincerity; it is a pity as things have turned out; I was
quite happy here working by myself, and got along fairly comfortably,
and I think now that we have had our pleasant fooling and the crisis is
reached I should like to offer you your freedom."
"Thank you," he answered grimly, and he stood looking down from his six
feet of brawny manhood upon the small determined figure in front of him
busily engaged in withdrawing the ring--her sole article of jewellery--
from the third finger of her left hand. She held the shining circlet,
emblem of their mutual love, towards him with a smile upon her lips, but
he made no attempt to take it though he understood the significance of
her action well enough.
"Wouldn't you like to keep it to wear on the other hand?" he enquired
sarcastically. "It isn't etiquette, I know; but ladies do it sometimes,
I believe."
"But your freedom?" Jill persisted, still holding the ring before his
eyes. "Won't you take that?"
"Oh, certainly," he replied disagreeably, "but _that_ doesn't constitute
my freedom, does it?" with a contemptuous glance at the small golden
hoop in her hand.
"No, I suppose not," the girl answered in a voice of such blank
disappointment that St. John grinned despite his ill-humour; her
lugubrious expression aroused his mirth. Jill saw nothing to laugh at.
The situation had assumed for her quite a tragic aspect, and her eyes
blazed with a very wrathful light as she gazed witheringly up into his
broadly smiling face.
"I don't see," she observed icily, "that my remark called for any
violent ebullition of mirth. I wasn't aware that I had said anything
funny. Is there insanity in your family?"
"Not that I know of," he replied, taking possession of both ring and
hand as he spoke, and keeping his hold despite her angry attempt to free
herself. "'Pon my word, Jill, you're enough to try a fellow's patience.
You deserved to be taken at your word just now, and didn't expect to
be, that's the joke. And now I've got to put this ring back in its
place, I suppose. The next time that you take it off for the childish
satisfaction of dangling it an inch from my nose I shall keep it and
give it to some other girl."
"Miss Bolton perhaps?" remarked Jill in her nastiest tone.
"Don't you think it would be better," he suggested without looking at
her, "to leave Evie's name out of our disputes?"
"I don't know whether you consider it gentlemanly," Jill cried fiercely,
"to try and make me feel mean?"
"I'm glad if I have succeeded in making you feel it," he answered
imperturbably, patting the ring in place, and slowly releasing her hand,
"for you certainly are mean. Your meanness is, in fact, only to be
equalled by your bad temper and that exceeds it. I am not blind to your
faults you may observe; they are as plentiful as flies in summer, and
equally irritating."
"And to think," exclaimed Jill in exasperation, "that I was going to
give you up just for your personal benefit! I won't now; if you try to
back out of it I'll have you up for breach of promise."
"You will, will you? Jove! I almost believe you would. And you'd win
your case too, for if you looked as belligerent as you do at present the
jury would be afraid to give it against you. It isn't a bit of use,
Jill, getting nasty; I'm in such an angelic frame of mind myself that
not even you could put me out. Get your hat on, old girl, and let's go
and look for our shop together. We are going to become public
benefactors, and hand down to posterity the idealised representatives of
the present generation."
Jill smiled scornfully.
"I am sorry for the idealisation if you are going to operate; they'll be
more like caricatures I'm thinking. What do you know about
photography?"
"Know about it!" echoed St. John indignantly. "Why I've got a camera of
my own; Evie and I used to dabble a good deal in photography at one
time."
"It strikes me that you _dabbled_ in a great many things," retorted
Jill. "Perhaps that accounts for the very indifferent manner in which
you do everything. If you are counting on your amateur efforts solely,
I fear we shall end in the bankruptcy court."
"Jill," he said very gravely, and in such an altered tone that Jill
looked up in surprise, "are you afraid to throw in your lot with mine
now that my circumstances are almost as destitute and uncertain as your
own?"
Jill gave a gasp. For a moment she looked as if about to offer an
indignant protest, the next she dissolved into tears. St. John's
half-formed suspicions faded immediately. His father had planted them
in his mind the night before. He had said "tell her that you are
penniless and see how sincere her love will prove." The girl's
uncertain mood had recalled the words to his memory but he knew as soon
as he had spoken by the look in her eyes that he had entirely misjudged
her.
"How can you say such unkind things?" she cried. "I believe you are
trying to make me hate you."
"Darling," he said contritely, slipping his arm about her, and holding
her closely to him, "forgive me; I didn't mean it, indeed I didn't."
"You did," sobbed Jill. "You thought that I had been running after you
as a good speculation--"
"Don't, dear," he entreated, "you make me feel so ashamed of myself."
"And so you ought to," she answered, drying her eyes on the corner of
her painting apron, and looking up at him with a very woebegone face.
"I shall never forget that, I'm afraid; I have a horrid memory for cruel
things, and I have loved you so truly all the time. I would go through
a dozen bankruptcy courts with you, and--and--and end up in the
work-house even sooner than lose you now."
She dropped her head again with a fresh burst of tears, and St. John
felt as intensely miserable as it is possible for a man to feel,
intensely ashamed of himself also for giving voice to such an unjust
suspicion. He racked his brains in search of something soothing, but
the only thing he could find to say was,--
"Don't keep hitting a fellow when he's down, Jill."
It wasn't a very brilliant, nor a very original remark, but it was the
very luckiest thing he could have hit upon. Its effect on Jill was
marvellous; she recollected what she might have remembered sooner, that
he had been passing through very stormy times lately, and all on her
account. A man does not generally relish breaking with his family and
throwing up a luxurious home for the doubtful prospect of earning his
own living when he has not been brought up to any profession, and hasn't
a superabundance of capital to launch him into a going concern. St.
John had certainly not relished it, but he had made no complaint and had
met his ill fortune with a cheerfulness and pluck which did him infinite
credit. Jill mopped her eyes again vigorously and put both arms around
his neck.
"I have been horrid," she said; "I have done nothing but worried you
ever since you came, and you were worried enough before. Jack dear, I'm
afraid we shall quarrel dreadfully after we are married. I really am
bad-tempered, and you are not--not altogether amiable, are you?"
St. John laughed.
"I don't care," he said, "so long as we make it up again. Rows are like
hills in cycling, beastly at first, but when you're used to 'em a flat
road seems dreadfully monotonous."
Jill saw very little of her fiance during the next week. He was busy
looking for something to do! for she had declared that until he found
permanent occupation their marriage must be postponed; she was not going
to take such a serious plunge on the strength of the five hundred
pounds. St. John acknowledged the wisdom of her decision but chafed at
the delay. Having been ejected from the paternal roof he was anxious to
have a home of his own, and more than anxious to see Jill at the head of
his frugal board. He was not quite sure how Jill existed; it worried
him rather to think of her poverty; but she would take no assistance
from him. Once he deprecatingly offered her a ten pound note which she
however firmly refused. She would not allow him to support her until he
had the right to do so.
"Don't you think that that's rather straining at a gnat?" he said.
"Perhaps," she answered smiling. "But you would not like to think that
your coming had lessened my pride and independence, and made me lazy and
unselfreliant, would you? If I actually need assistance I will come to
you, dear old boy."
And so he had gone forth in search of a livelihood more than ever
anxious for the ceremony to come off, and not a little eager to commence
the new life of independence and hard work. St. John had a friend who
knew everything. There is a difference between a man who knows
everything and the man who thinks he does; St. John's friend was the
right sort, and he put him in the way of the very thing he was looking
for. A photographer of the firm of Thompkins and Co, having recently
dissolved partnership through the Co, setting up for himself was
advertising through the regular channels for a new partner. St. John's
friend having some slight acquaintance with Thompkins introduced the
two, and eventually St. John invested his capital and returned to the
studio in triumph to inform Jill with much pride and satisfaction that
he represented the Co in "Thompkins and Co.--photographers."