But I see through the darkness the souls of my Kippses, as they are, as little pink strips of living stuff, like the bodies of little, ill-nourished, ailing, ignorant children, children who feel pain, who are naughty and muddled and suffer and do not understand why. And the claw of this Beast rests upon them!
III
Terminations
Next morning came a remarkable telegram from Folkestone. “Please come at once, urgent, Walshingham,” said the telegram, and Kipps, after an agitated but still ample breakfast, departed. …
When he returned his face was very white and his countenance disordered. He let himself in with his latchkey and came into the dining-room where Ann sat, affecting to work at a little thing she called a bib. She heard his hat fall in the hall before he entered, as though he had missed the peg. “I got something to tell you, Ann,” he said, disregarding their overnight quarrel, and went to the hearthrug and took hold of the mantel, and stared at Ann as though the sight of her was novel.
“Well?” said Ann, not looking up and working a little faster.
“ ’E’s gone!”
Ann looked up sharply and her hands stopped. “Who’s gone?” For the first time she perceived Kipps’ pallor.
“Young Walshingham—I saw ’er and she tole me.”
“Gone? What d’you mean?”
“Cleared out! Gone off for good!”
“What for?”
“For ’is ’ealth,” said Kipps, with sudden bitterness. “ ’E’s been speckylating. He’s speckylated our money and ’e’s speckylated their money, and now ’e’s took ’is ’ook. That’s all about it, Ann.”
“You mean?”
“I mean ’e’s orf and our twenty-four thousand’s orf, too! And ’ere we are! Smashed up! That’s all about it, Ann.” He panted.
Ann had no vocabulary for such an occasion. “Oh, Lor’!” she said, and sat still.
Kipps came about and stuck his hands deeply in his trouser pockets. “Speckylated every penny—lorst it all—and gorn.”
Even his lips were white.
“You mean we ain’t got nothin’ left, Artie?”
“Not a penny! Not a bloomin’ penny, Ann. No!”
A gust of passion whirled across the soul of Kipps. He flung out a knuckly fist. “If I ’ad ’im ’ere,” he said, “I’d—I’d—I’d wring ’is neck for ’im. I’d—I’d—” His voice rose to a shout. He thought of Gwendolen in the kitchen and fell to “Ugh!”
“But, Artie,” said Ann, trying to grasp it, “d’you mean to say he’s took our money?”
“Speckylated it!” said Kipps, with an illustrative flourish of the arm, that failed to illustrate. “Bort things dear and sold ’em cheap, and played the ’ankey-pankey jackass with everything we got. That’s what I mean ’e’s done, Ann.” He repeated this last sentence with the addition of violent adverbs.
“D’you mean to say our money’s gone, Artie?”
“Ter-dash it, Yes, Ann!” swore Kipps, exploding in a shout. “Ain’t I tellin’ you?”
He was immediately sorry. “I didn’t mean to ’oller at you, Ann,” he said, “but I’m all shook up. I don’t ’ardly know what I’m sayin’. Ev’ry penny.” …
“But, Artie—”
Kipps grunted. He went to the window and stared for a moment at a sunlit sea. “Gord!” he swore.
“I mean,” he said, coming back to Ann and with an air of exasperation, “that he’s ’bezzled and ’ooked it. That’s what I mean, Ann.”
Ann put down the bib. “But wot are we going to do, Artie?”
Kipps indicated ignorance, wrath and despair with one comprehensive gesture of his hands. He caught an ornament from the mantel and replaced it. “I’m going to bang about,” he said, “if I ain’t precious careful.”
“You saw ’er, you say?”
“Yes.”
“What did she say ’xactly?” said Ann.
“Told me to see a s’licitor—tole me to get someone to ’elp me at once. She was there in black—like she used to be—and speaking cool and careful-like. ’Elen! … She’s precious ’ard, is ’Elen. She looked at me straight. ‘It’s my fault,’ she said, ‘I ought to ’ave warned you. … Only under the circumstances it was a little difficult.’ Straight as anything. I didn’t ’ardly say anything to ’er. I didn’t seem to begin to take it in until she was showing me out. I ’adn’t anything to say. Jest as well, perhaps. She talked like a call a’most. She said—what was it she said about her mother? ‘My mother’s overcome with grief,’ she said, ‘so naturally everything comes on me.’ ”
“And she told you to get someone to ’elp you?”
“Yes. I been to old Bean.”
“O’ Bean?”
“Yes. What I took my business away from!”
“What did he say?”
“He was a bit off’and at first, but then ’e come ’round. He couldn’t tell me anything till ’e knew the facts. What I know of young Walshingham, there won’t be much ’elp in the facts. No!”
He reflected for a space. “It’s a smash-up, Ann. More likely than not, Ann, ’e’s left us over’ead in debt. We got to get out of it just ’ow we can. …
“We got to begin again,” he went on. “’Ow, I don’t know. All the way ’ome my ’ead’s been going. We got to get a
