living tended greatly to improve her figure and complexion; so that in course of time, the gods smiling again upon her, she married a foreman printer, and passes out of this story.
Meanwhile, Mr. Reginald Peters--older, and the possessor, perhaps, of more sense--looked at Miss Ramsbotham with new eyes, and now not tolerated but desired her. Bohemia waited to assist at the happy termination of a pretty and somewhat novel romance. Miss Ramsbotham had shown no sign of being attracted elsewhere. Flattery, compliment, she continued to welcome; but merely, so it seemed, as favourable criticism. Suitors more fit and proper were now not lacking, for Miss Ramsbotham, though a woman less desirable when won, came readily to the thought of wooing. But to all such she turned a laughing face.
'I like her for it,' declared Susan Fossett; 'and he has improved--there was room for it--though I wish it could have been some other. There was Jack Herring--it would have been so much more suitable. Or even Joe, in spite of his size. But it's her wedding, not ours; and she will never care for anyone else.'
And Bohemia bought its presents, and had them ready, but never gave them. A few months later Mr. Reginald Peters returned to Canada, a bachelor. Miss Ramsbotham expressed her desire for another private interview with Peter Hope.
'I may as well keep on the Letter to Clorinda,' thought Miss Ramsbotham. 'I have got into the knack of it. But I will get you to pay me for it in the ordinary way.'
'I would rather have done so from the beginning,' explained Peter.
'I know. I could not in conscience, as I told you, take from both sides. For the future--well, they have said nothing; but I expect they are beginning to get tired of it.'
'And you!' questioned Peter.
'Yes. I am tired of it myself,' laughed Miss Ramsbotham. 'Life isn't long enough to be a well-dressed woman.'
'You have done with all that?'
'I hope so,' answered Miss Ramsbotham.
'And don't want to talk any more about it?' suggested Peter.
'Not just at present. I should find it so difficult to explain.'
By others, less sympathetic than old Peter, vigorous attempts were made to solve the mystery. Miss Ramsbotham took enjoyment in cleverly evading these tormentors. Thwarted at every point, the gossips turned to other themes. Miss Ramsbotham found interest once again in the higher branches of her calling; became again, by slow degrees, the sensible, frank, 'good sort' that Bohemia had known, liked, respected--everything but loved.
Years later, to Susan Fossett, the case was made clear; and through Susan Fossett, a nice enough woman but talkative, those few still interested learned the explanation.
'Love,' said Miss Ramsbotham to the bosom friend, 'is not regulated by reason. As you say, there were many men I might have married with much more hope of happiness. But I never cared for any other man. He was not intellectual, was egotistical, possibly enough selfish. The man should always be older than the woman; he was younger, and he was a weak character. Yet I loved him.'
'I am glad you didn't marry him,' said the bosom friend.
'So am I,' agreed Miss Ramsbotham.
'If you can't trust me,' had said the bosom friend at this point, 'don't.'
'I meant to do right,' said Miss Ramsbotham, 'upon my word of honour I did, in the beginning.'
'I don't understand,' said the bosom friend.
'If she had been my own child,' continued Miss Ramsbotham, 'I could not have done more--in the beginning. I tried to teach her, to put some sense into her. Lord! the hours I wasted on that little idiot! I marvel at my own patience. She was nothing but an animal. An animal! she had only an animal's vices. To eat and drink and sleep was her idea of happiness; her one ambition male admiration, and she hadn't character enough to put sufficient curb upon her stomach to retain it. I reasoned with her, I pleaded with her, I bullied her. Had I persisted I might have succeeded by sheer physical and mental strength in restraining her from ruining herself. I was winning. I had made her frightened of me. Had I gone on, I might have won. By dragging her out of bed in the morning, by insisting upon her taking exercise, by regulating every particle of food and drink she put into her mouth, I kept the little beast in good condition for nearly three months. Then, I had to go away into the country for a few days; she swore she would obey my instructions. When I came back I found she had been in bed most of the time, and had been living chiefly on chocolate and cakes. She was curled up asleep in an easy-chair, snoring with her mouth wide open, when I opened the door. And at sight of that picture the devil came to me and tempted me. Why should I waste my time, wear myself out in mind and body, that the man I loved should marry a pig because it looked like an angel? 'Six months' wallowing according to its own desires would reveal it in its true shape. So from that day I left it to itself. No, worse than that--I don't want to spare myself--I encouraged her. I let her have a fire in her bedroom, and half her meals in bed. I let her have chocolate with tablespoonfuls of cream floating on the top: she loved it. She was never really happy except when eating. I let her order her own meals. I took a fiendish delight watching the dainty limbs turning to shapeless fat, the pink-and-white complexion growing blotchy. It is flesh that man loves; brain and mind and heart and soul! he never thinks of them. This little pink-and-white sow could have cut me out with Solomon himself. Why should such creatures have the world arranged for them, and we not be allowed to use our brains in our own defence? But for my looking-glass I might have resisted the temptation, but I always had something of the man in me: the sport of the thing appealed to me. I suppose it was the nervous excitement under which I was living that was changing me. All my sap was going into my body. Given sufficient time, I might meet her with her own weapons, animal against animal. Well, you know the result: I won. There was no doubt about his being in love with me. His eyes would follow me round the room, feasting on me. I had become a fine animal. Men desired me, Do you know why I refused him? He was in every way a better man than the silly boy I had fallen in love with; but he came back with a couple of false teeth: I saw the gold setting one day when he opened his mouth to laugh. I don't say for a moment, my dear, there is no such thing as love--love pure, ennobling, worthy of men and women, its roots in the heart and nowhere else. But that love I had missed; and the other! I saw it in its true light. I had fallen in love with him because he was a pretty, curly-headed boy. He had fallen in love with Peggy when she was pink-and-white and slim. I shall always see the look that came into his eyes when she spoke to him at the hotel, the look of disgust and loathing. The girl was the same; it was only her body that had grown older. I could see his eyes fixed upon my arms and neck. I had got to grow old in time, brown skinned, and wrinkled. I thought of him, growing bald, fat--'
'If you had fallen in love with the right man,' had said Susan Fossett, 'those ideas would not have come to you.'
'I know,' said Miss Ramsbotham. 'He will have to like me thin and in these clothes, just because I am nice, and good company, and helpful. That is the man I am waiting for.'
He never came along. A charming, bright-eyed, white-haired lady occupies alone a little flat in the Marylebone Road, looks in occasionally at the Writers' Club. She is still Miss Ramsbotham.
Bald-headed gentlemen feel young again talking to her: she is so sympathetic, so big-minded, so understanding. Then, hearing the clock strike, tear themselves from her with a sigh, and return home--some of them--to stupid shrewish wives.
STORY THE FIFTH
Joey Loveredge Agrees--On Certain Terms--To Join the Company
The most popular member of the Autolycus Club was undoubtedly Joseph Loveredge. Small, chubby, clean- shaven, his somewhat longish, soft, brown hair parted in the middle, strangers fell into the error of assuming him to be younger than he really was. It is on record that a leading lady novelist--accepting her at her own estimate-- irritated by his polite but firm refusal to allow her entrance into his own editorial office without appointment, had once boxed his ears, under the impression that he was his own office-boy. Guests to the Autolycus Club, on being introduced to him, would give to him kind messages to take home to his father, with whom they remembered having been at school together. This sort of thing might have annoyed anyone with less sense of humour. Joseph Loveredge would tell such stories himself, keenly enjoying the jest--was even suspected of inventing some of the more improbable. Another fact tending to the popularity of Joseph Loveredge among all classes, over and above his
